hadiya pendleton. and tony bennett will be there at the invitation of nancy pelosi. bennett is an outspoken proponent of gun control. i'm brook baldwin, thank you so much for being with me here, let's go to wolf blitzer in washington. hey, wolf. >> happening now, a stricken ship plagued by raw sewage, some 4,000 passengers and crew describe conditions on the carnival try turn to be disgusting. and north korea's young leader defies the world with an underground nuclear test and now the world is responding. i'm wolf blitzer, you're in "the situation room."

a picture of nightmare at sea. these passengers on the carnival triumph aren't on deck to soak up the sun, they're trying to escape the unbearable stench of raw sewage reportedly dripping down walls in long hallways. the national transportation safety board just announced they will join -- after two days the triumph is now being towed to mobile, alabama, with more than 23,000 passengers whose vacation stories have turned into horror stories. another 1,000 crewmembers are aboard. >> reporter: wolf, the carnival

cr cruise ship triumph will dock behind me. when it gets here it will be greeted by members of the u.s. coast guard and the nationshtio transportation safety board. it's no exaggeration to say this cruise to paradise has turned into a cruise through hell. >> raw sewage, pretty bad. when you walk in the hallways, you have to cover your face, we don't have any masks for breathing. it's just disgusting. >> reporter: sunday's fire which disabled the cruise ship's engines, disabled many of the toilets t hot water and the air conditioners. >> the rooms are very hot unless you have a balcony room and then you can kind of get air and light, but if you have an interior room like mine, it's pretty dark in there and pretty

smelly especially if someone used your bathroom. >> reporter: as for food -- >> bread, boxed cereal and water and sodas and they just opened the bar to give people free beer and wine. >> reporter: fresh food is being brought aboard from other cruise ships. tug boats are brewing the ship to port in the mobile, alabama. meanwhile the crew are doing what they can. >> we're not having as much fun as what we had planned, but everyone seems to be doing okay. >> when the passengers disembark near the city of mobile, officials say they plan to have medical personnel available just in case anyone needs to get checked out. in the meantime, carnival making plans to get everyone back home providing them with a plane

ticket, also providing refunds for the cruise they have just been on and as well, wolf a credit for a cruise if they decide to take another one in the future. >> so at least until wednesday night maybe even thursday, they're going to be stuck on there. i assume they thought about getting another boat out and transferring everyone to another ship, but that was impractical, is that what the explanation was. >> transferring people from large vessels like that to another vessel is very problematic out in the open seas and right now the ship has had some trouble with the wind, it's actually listing a couple of addition, it's not a safety problem, but they do have some environmental factors to consider as well. the best thing is to keep everybody on that ship and bring them right here to disembark. >> much more coming up on this story, thanks very much. and to our viewers, you can read mother of the passenger's

descriptions of these very unpleasant conditions on board. go to our website cnn.com for more on that. other news we're following, cnn has learned president obama will talk about north korea's latest nuclear test in a state of the union test later tonight. the underground blast was so strong, it was actually registered as a magnitude 5.1 earthquake by seismologists. let's go to chris over at the pentagon. >> south korean officials estimate that this explosion could have been as high as 6 to 7 militons. the key thing is whether north korea managed to miniaturize the device, that is make it small enough that one day soon they would be able to marry a nuclear

war head on top of a long range missile. >> reporter: on the eve of president obama's address to the american people, north korea sent a message of its own and mumsed its way into the state of union. >> they represent a serious threat to the united states of america. we have got to be prepared to deal with that. >> reporter: north korea detonated an explosion deep under ground. the u.s. military deployed a special plane to japan that collects radioactive particles. but the plume has to extend outside north korean air space before the plane can collect samples. >> we'll find out everything i have got to say tonight. >> reporter: sources say president obama adjusted his speech to mention north korea's nuclear ambitions, but after the u.n. called an emergency meeting, the message is already being delivered. >> it will not be tolerated and they will be met with north

korea's increasing isolation. >> reporter: that means sanctions, although how do you isolate the world's most isolated regime is an open question. >> we are looking at the full sweep of options. >> reporter: officials say they will go to the iran playbook, sanctions specific individuals. >> you can't just play nuke kpleer whac-a-mole. >> this test proves the u.s. cannot crush the regime. >> if you cannot force them to comply, and we can't. the only choice you have left is one of engagement. >> it's going to be a few days before we know, but it's going to narrow if north korea used uranium at this time. north korea can mine uranium at home. >> a lot of analysts out there

are suggesting that the new young leader of north korea, chris, kim jong-un, he's taking these provocative steps. >> the same thing we always hear, wolf, we hear a lot of that, but the one thing it's always followed by is the caveat, we just don't know for sure. there is an incredible amount of frustration in the fact that they can never entirely pinpoint exactly what the motives are behind anything that north korea does, although you're right, there is a lot of sentiment that this may be more domestically driven more so than outward towards the world. >> thank you very much. chris lawrence over near the pentagon. we are awaiting the nomination of chuck hagel's nomination to become the next defense secretary. the congress is meeting right now, it is expected to approve

the nomination along party lines. the saga of chuck hagel is by no means over with yet. we are just learning now details about what president obama will say at tonight's state of the union address. new video emerging from southern california that appears to show that the former police officer wanted for multiple murders was actually -- was he buying scuba gear and if he was, why? plus growing vatican intrigue about who will be in charge when the open steps down attend of this month. plus word of pope benedict's secret surgery. new jammin jerk chicken soup has tasty pieces of chicken with rice and beans. hmmm. for giant hunger! thanks mom! see ya! whoaa...oops!

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could give police new clues as they fire the police officer wanted for multiple murders. casey wians has latest. what's going on? there's a lot of activity especially in what's called the big bear area? >> we are hearing those reports of increaseded law enforcement activity in the big bear area, which is the area where christopher dorner was last known or suspected to have been, i just talked to the spokeswoman here at the police station. we do know that investigators are looking at more than 1,000 clues in their effort to find christopher dorner. >> could this video of a man resembling murder system christopher dorner provide a clue to his whereabouts? the video obtained by tmz shows him walking through the aisles

of a southern california sporting goods store, he's carrying what appears to be one large scuba tank and one smaller one to the check out counter. >> they're going to look at the transactions that occurred at that time at that store and try to line up and make sure those transactions were done by dorner and that dorner is actually the one depicted in the video. >> reporter: investigators say last week dorner tried to steal a boat in san diego and his wallet and id were found near the san yisidro port of mexico. in los angeles, reported dorner sightings have poured into the command center. yesterday when officials offered

a $1 million reward for dorner's arrest and conviction, the number of tips have increased to more than 1,000. u but investigators concede they still don't know where he is. >> we're hopeful something will break loose from the public. >> a door to door search continues in the big bear area. residents with security cameras are being asked to check with dorner. lapd families remain under police protection because they are linked to targets mentioned in dorner's manifesto. >> we believe these are all very viable targets. >> the school in arcadia closed for a second day. its pastor is related to someone threatened by dorner. >> one law enforcement source telling us, wolf, we really have to think out of the box with this guy. he's been one step ahead of us. of course we'll let you know if that continues if we get anymore information and confirm those reports that we're hearing out

of the big bear area, wolf. >> correct me if i'm wrong, dorner had some sort of long standing connection to that big bear area, he's pretty familiar with the area, maybe that's why he went back there, is that right? >> that's certainly one of the things that investigators have been looking at, a known associate of dorner, according to the marshall's arrest warrant, his family has property in the big bear area. dorner's vehicle when it was found on thursday on fire, was very near that property. so that's one of the things that they have been looking at to see if he had any kind of assistance from anybody or any connection to that area and may have been one of the places where he fled. wolf? >> this search is about as huge a search in southern california as we have seen in a long time. the folks really want to catch this guy? >> absolutely, i can't tell you how on edge the law enforcement community has been for well over a week now.

50 members of the lapd and their families on 24-hour -- being protected 24 hours by the security detail of the lapd because they are identified as potential targets of dorner, people that he has mentioned in his manifesto, very much on edge. it's one of those weird situations where the general public is nervous, but the law enforcement officers who are sworn to protect the again public are the most nervous because they're the ones that dorner has vowed to target. >> there's all kinds of tips coming in, including the l.a. times claiming there was an exchange in fire between dorner and local law enforcement, is there anything you know about this. >> there's nothing i can confirm other than i have heard those reports as well, wolf, and we just spoke with public information officers here at headquarters and they are in touch with the command post up there in the big bear area, so far there's nothing they can

tell us to confirm whether those gunshots are related to dorner and his possible apprehension. >> they thought they were close to this guy and it turned out to be false alarms, if you will, so everyone wants to be very, very precise right now. this is obviously the most sensitive issue out there. >> that's right. there have been false sightings in tijuana, false sightings in a big box home improvement store north of los angeles, more than 1,000 tips have come in since officials announced a $1 million reward for information leading to dorner's capture and conviction. we'll see if any of those turned out to be the tips that led them, if in fact that's what's going on, to christopher dorner. >> the "l.a. times" suggesting

that this gun battle possibly may be involving dorner, may have occurred when he was trying to burglarize a home as part of an effort to steal a car. we know his other car had been burned to a crisp, if you will, these are unconfirmed reports, there are a lot of local tv stations, the l.a. times now suggests there has been an exchange of gun fire believed to be with dorner but we have not independently confirmed that, the "l.a. times" tweetding just a little while ago, christopher dorner was engaged in a shoot-out with authorities in the big bear area. when we say federal authorities, fbi, local authorities, a lot of law enforcement are involved in this massive man hunt. >> and we also know through law enforcement that they expect and have anticipated that dorner is very well armed, very dangerous, his manifesto, they talked about his expertise as a marksman

trained in the military. he delivered to our own anderson cooper, a medallion that had bullet holes in it. so they're very aware that he is apparently well armed and it's no surprise if in fact this is what happened that there has been an exclang of gun fire, wolf. >> and this new report, also from the "l.a. times," i'll read it to our viewers, source says the gun battle occurred after dorner allegedly tried to burglarize a home and steal a car. the "l.a. times" says dorner's condition was not clear. we know he has been on the run now for several days after allegedly killing three people in the southern california area, but these reports from the "l.a. times," local tv stations suggesting that there's been an exchange of gun fire and that they may, repeat may be -- they may have involved christopher dorner. we have not, once again, independently confirmed this. and we do know, casey, and i want to be precise, we do know,

based on our own reporting heightened activity in that big bear area? casey, we know there's been heightened activity in the past hour or two in that big bear area? >> that's right, wolf and law enforcement officials i have just been told by my producer chuck connor, law enforcement officials now confirm to cnn that there has been an exchange in gun fire, they believe involving dorner. there are reports that he was involved in an attempt to steal a vehicle. we can now confirm that law enforcement has engaged christopher dorner in the area east of los angeles, those mountains near big bear, wolf. >> how far is that big bear mountain area, how far is that from the los angeles area? >> it's about a two-hour drive from downtown los angeles, give or take a few, it's a very windy road up there, several ways to get into the big bear area, it's

one of the local ski resorts that angelinos go to, it's a day trip, there are a lot of residents in that area, some of these residences vacant for most of the year, law enforcement officials have gone door to door for the past week or so searching for dorner. hundreds of law enforcement officers in that big bear area last week, those numbers have been scaled down gradually, on saturday there were 125 people searching for him. and just over the last couple of days, that number had dwindled to 30. and it appears that search has paid off, wolf. >> we don't know what happened that we have confirmed that there's been an exchange of gun fire and we believe it involves christopher dorner, we don't know what the end result is, if he's alive, what his condition

is, if he was found, those questions remain unanswered, right, casey. >> let me read you what we do have, law enforcement is responding to reports that are believed to be credible that christopher dorner has been sighted and may have been involved in a robbery in the big bear area. san bernardino sheriff's deputies are currently responding and are in touch with the command post in big bear. the robbery possibly involved the stealing of a vehicle. that's the latest that we have, wolf. >> we don't know if dorner has been shot, we don't know his condition, and we don't know if he's in custody or still on the loose, isn't that right? >> that is absolutely correct. what we do know is that investigators who were searching for dorn never that big bear area, had helicopters at their disposal ready to go, they have been using those helicopters in the search, it seems very likely that if they have engaged in, and they have found where he is, that he's not going to get away,

wolf. >> so many people are looking for him. we're now being told, i guess, casey, one of the local stations in los angeles reporting that the local government's fish and game officials were sbovd in this gun fire with someone that they believe to be dorner. law enforcement officials on the scene as part of a massive, massive man hunt underway. there's a $1 million reward for information leading to the arrest of christopher dorner. we have no idea whether that reward played any role in that gun fire with that individual believed to be christopher dorner. as you have been reported, there's been literally, what, 1,000 tips in the past few days, some leads that have been coming in, is that right? >> that's right, there were 250 leads as of saturday. then the los angeles city government and the governments of other cities, counties

throughout southern california put together a $1 million reward hoping that that would lead someone who may have known where dorner was, perhaps even someone who may have been assisting him in some way, to come forward and give them information that would lead to his apprehension and ultimately his conviction. once that reward was posted, the number of calls and tips received by the task force looking for dorner quadrupled, from 250 to 1,000 tips within just a matter of days, wolf. so the public response was overwhelming. we don't know, though, if this engagement with dorner or this sighting of dorner, this encounter was the result of a tip. we mentioned the fish and game officials, that's very remote territory up in the big bear area, up in the mountains, it would make sense that they would be among the people best suited

to find him knowing that back country so well, wolf. >> this is what we know right now, based on law enforcement sources providing this information to cnn, law enforcement is responding to reports that are believed to be credible, i want to be precise, believed to be credible, that christopher dorner has been sighted and may have been involved in a robbery in the big bear area, san bernardino sheriffs are currently responding and are in touch with the robbery at big bear. what do you see, what are you learning? >> well, wolf, we're actually on the road just west of big bear. with the sirens on, we immediately -- to be quite frank with you, we don't know exactly

where they are at this moment, for the last several days, we know that there has been a heavy law enforcement presence here, they have been going on searches, they have been doing air searches, ground searches, today we're told that the air searches have stopped and it's been pretty much ground searches. other than that right now, what you've been reporting, we're working on more details. and as we get them, we'll bring them to you. >> this vehicle that has been destroyed, that has been found where you are in the big bear area, chris, isn't that right? >> yes, just a few miles from where i'm standing right now. the reports that have been out there indicate that at least if they turn out to be accurate, these reports say that what's happening now is occurring -- it doesn't appear that what is happening -- what christopher dorner's connection with big

bear is? i have seen some reports that relatives or family and friends that had a home there, that he was very familiar with this mountainous area outside los angeles. >> yeah, there were various reports that he had acquainta e acquaintancacquaintanc acquaintances here in the area, and there were reports that his mother had at one time owned some property south of the big bear area, it was not a house, but she owned some property there. that's all the intel that we have to go on at this poichlt. but authorities say yes, he knew someone and had connections to this area, but whether or not he came up here to stay and then leave, or if he was staying for a longer period of time or if he was planning to go back down the mountain and head somewhere else. this search as you know has extended from new mexico to nevada. >> casey is still with us, casey wians, can you hear me okay. >> i can, wolf. >> just remind our viewers why potentially what's happening in

the big bear area is so critically important right now. what's been going on these last several days in southern california and why there has been this massive man hunt underway for viewers who may just been tuning in right now. >> the story began, wolf, a week ago sunday when two people aen engaged couple, a woman who was the, one of the coaches of the cal state fullerton women's basketball team, her father was a former lapd official, her fiance, a public safety officer at the university of southern california were killed by multiple gunshots that police now say were fired by christopher dorner. he's a former los angeles police department officer who was fired several years ago and he posted a very long manifesto, on social media, vowing revenge against the lapd, he targeted -- he

vowed revenge against specific individuals and their families and that's one of the things that has folks here, law enforcement in southern california so worried. several days later, in the community of corona, just east of los angeles, he fired shots at two los angeles police officers and then in the city of riverside, he fired shots again at two riverside police officers. killing one of them. that police officer, 34 years old, 11-year veteran of the riverside police department, someone who was also a veteran of the u.s. marine corps, who served two tours in kuwait. since then he has been gone, they have not been able to find christopher dorner, although we have talked about the thousands of tips that have come in while they have been looking for him. they did find his truck burning in the community of big bear,

near property that was owned by family members of a known associate of donor. there has been videotape where he was seen in the san diego area, that cnn aired exclusively over the weekend showing him behind an auto accessories store dumping items into the dumpster, the owner of that store reported it to police, it turned out to be magazines filled with bullets, a helmet and also a military style belt. there's video that we showed not too long ago shown by the website tmz buying and refilling scuba tanks in a los angeles area scuba score two days before the first two killings of that engaged couple. and two u.s. marshals suspected he may have been trying to head to mexico. he had apparently tried to steal

a boat in mexico and his id was found in that area. >> we're hearing from the pio here in san bernardino at the sheriff's office, they're saying this is an ongoing incident, they will not confirm what the person involved is dorner or isn't and they will not say -- dorn sir not in custody, that's what they're saying at this point, dorner is not in custody and there's no confirmation that an officer is down. that's the new information we have got at this point. >> but it is ongoing? in other words the incident is continuing because we're hearing these reports that people in the area are still hearing gunshots. >> that's right, the incident is definitely ongoing, there seems to be a lot of chaos on law enforcement's side and definitely on the media side. there's definitely reports out there in the media right now. >> we're going to be very, very

precise, it's believed dorner, but we don't know that 100%. joe johns has been checking with his sources, joe, what have you learn. >> the first question is we do know or we think we know that federal officers were involved. so the question is which federal assets and that's important. we have been checking again and again with the united states marshall service and we know or at least we think we know, the united states marshall service is involved in looking for him, particularly the west coast fugitive squad, those are among the people who might have engaged in suspected, whoever he was at that time. we also know the fbi is out there, atf, the federal bureau of alcohol, tobacco, firearms and explosives. so all these people are out there looking for this man. and this guy is thought to have a lot of weapons at his disposal, including a 50 caliber

rifle, a sniper rifle, even an earth to sky missile launcher. so there's a lot of different things when they engage this suspect with weapons, wolf. >> you see these aerial shots coming in from our affiliate kabc in the big bear area, there is an incident that is ongoing, casey wian is getting more information. what else are you learning, casey? >> hi, wolf, the san bernardino police department is confirming that they are in the process right now of chasing a 4-wheel-drive pick-up truck. again, chasing a 4-wheel, drive pick-up truck through apparently the mountainous terrain near the community of big bear. i want to add one other thing, wolf, if you read that manifesto that christopher dorner posted online, this is written at least in the beginning, in the past tense indicating that he had no desire to be taken alive. so these reports that we are hearing, unconfirmed reports

that we are hearing, exchanges of gun fire are not at all surprising, because he made it very clear that his manifesto was going to be discovered after he was dead, wolf. >> a lot of these unconfirmed reports coming in, continuing gun fire being heard, but as far as the officers being shot, or officers being gunned down, we can't confirm that, casey, right? >> we cannot confirm that at this point, wolf, there are those reports that are out there, but i do not have any information on that, i will say that that has been the greatest fear of everyone who has been trying to find christopher dorner for a week and a half or so, they are very worrieded about that list of people that he is targeting and their families. and as we have mentioned, 50 different families with ties to the los angeles police department under 24-hour protection since dorner has been on the loose, wolf. >> i just want you to repeat

what you just reported, casey, as far as this 4-wheel-drive vehicle, concerning a chase under way right now? what exactly have you learned. >> that's all that i have learned, san bernardino law officials saying they have confronted a 4-wheel-drive vehicle. >> being reported right now that there's a gun fight under way right now in the big bear area, the suspect in this particular case, christopher dorner is believed to be involved in this. we know that there's been an exchange of fire, we have independently confirmed that. there's no word on whether or not christopher dorner has been captured or injured in any way. but we do hear from these two affiliates out in los angeles that gun fire is being exchanged even as we speak right now.

so this clear, chris welch, let me bring you back into this conversation, this is clearly an ongoing operation right now. >> that's right, definitely an ongoing situation, as we reported just moments ago, actually, the pio, the public information officer at the san diego sheriff's department said that this incident is ongoing, she could not confirm that this was in fact dorner. there are other reports out there that are reporting that it was dorner. >> a car chase involved in big bear, right now a four-wheel vehicle, we suspect that dorner is involved in this, that's what all the reporting is, but there have been false alarms over the past few days so i don't want to

get too far ahead, but it looks like there's a major development unfolding right now. we're watching these shots coming in from our affiliate kabc in the big bear area, they're obviously looking for this car chase on the road in big bear. how big is this whole area, this big bear area? because we're looking at shots, but i have no idea how big this area -- i see a fire truck driving up there right now. >> the town itself is only about six square miles but the mountains around the area are much wider, they cover a much wider area than that, they have been searching not just the town but the back country, the wilderness so to speak, and there was about a foot or so of snow that came through thursday and friday. so that's made it harder to find him. there's been some speculation that dorner was not alive

anymore, maybe he was out there somewhere and did not make it because of these frigid, frigid temperatures. >> how cold is it out there right now. >> i would say it's about 15 degrees right now, maybe about 20 degrees right now, the sun came out so it's warmed things up a little bit. but overnight it got to about zero and the windchill on top of that, it makes things very difficult. >> in this small community, big bear, since this is where his other vehicle was found destroyed the other day, have people just basically stayed in their home or are they getting out of town? >> it's interesting because i think for the first couple of days there was more offense that fear in the air, but not literally half an hour ago, we were talking to some folks at a diner, who said we're really not that scared anymore, we believe he's not in the area. so people are getting back to their lives, school was back in session and that sort of thing. >> they didn't cancel school in

the area, the kids were all going to schools as if there was business as usual, is that right. >> yesterday when they returned to school, it was not exactly business as usual, parents were there, there was more law enforcement protection at the school, just to keep people's peace of mind. but today there was not kind of law enforcement present at least outside the school today, wolf. >> we are hearing from one of our affiliates, two officers have been shot, we don't know their condition, chris, you don't have anything specific on that, have you? >> on that, wolf, unfortunately, i do not. >> casey, bar you hearing, casey wian, you're all over this story, kabc reporting two officers have been shot? >> a couple of things come to mind, wolf, one a conversation i had just a few hours ago, before all this happened with a laurmt official and i asked him the

question, isn't it likely that dorner, if he's up in the big bear area, because remember, we had a big snowstorm in that area a couple of days ago, temperatures as chris mentioned have been very, very, very cold. i said isn't it likely that he is dead if he's still in that area? and that law enforcement official told me, it's a possibility, but don't forget this, guy's very experienced, it's very possible that he had the equipment, he had the gear to survive in this elements whether he got into a house or didn't get into a house. also, we have to point out that this has to be one of the nightmare scenarios for law enforcement, a heavily armed military and law enforcement train eed fugitive on the loose with a vendetta against police, endangering not only law enforcement but the general public. it's fortunate that that is not a very heavily populated area,

but it is a very dangerous situation if there is this ongoing pursuit and ongoing gun battles that i can't confirm from here. >> we are confirming now, according to our sources here at cnn that there was a home invasion believed to be involving chris dorner, and that he is pinneded down. i don't know precisely what that means, pinned down, in the area, whether he's pinned down as part of a car chase, pinned down in a specific area, these are live pictures that our viewers are seeing from our affiliate kabc, you see the activity in big bear, about a two-hour drive outside of los angeles, in a mountainous area, an area that christopher dorner is apparently familiar with. he apparently was involved in a

home invasion. we do know based on everything we're hearing right now that this incident, this operation is continuing right now. it has not been resolved by any means. joe johns, you've been checking in with your federal authorities here in washington, we know the bureau of alcohol, tobacco and firearms, the fbi, a lot of federal authorities are assisting local authorities in this massive man hunt. >> right, and it's a very tough situation, you can look at that picture right there and see the kind of terrain they're dealing with, so the most important question right now is he in a car or is he on foot? and if he's in a car he might very well be ease jerry to track for the authorities, if he's on foot, you can go behind those trees, you can go into crevasses. on foot it might be harder to pin down this man. you're right, wolf, it can mean just about anything, whether

pinned down means he was in a two or three-mile radius and can drive there or is he pinned down in a house. i know that authorities would very much like to end this man hunt soon because this guy has proved over and over again that he's a pretty good shot. >> and he's armed with a lot of experience as a former local lapd cop as well as in the u.s. navy, he served in afghanistan. >> his experience goes back and he knows how to shoot these firearms and we're talking about a 50 caliber barrett semi-automatic rifle. so that means he could put a round in a target up to a mile away. so if anybody walks in front of his gun sights from that kind of distance and if it's true he's carrying that kind of a weapon, it's a pretty formidable situation. >> we're being told, chris welch, that the schools now in the big bear area where you are

have been put on a lock down situation right now. apparently christopher dorner is still on the loose, supposedly pinned down, again we don't know what that means, pinned down, but the schools are in a lockdown area. chris welch, obviously makes a lot of sense. 3w45 if anything else are you picking zblup we got confirmation from a high school here in the area, bear valley unified school district has all schools locked down here in big bear. at this point we know it's an ongoing situation and we expect more information momentarily as well. >> the l.a. times reporting that this incident, that dorner apparently invaded someone's home, tied up two people, stole their car, and he is now being

chased apparently, there are numerous reports out there as well that two police officers have been shot, we don't know their condition. these are live pictures coming in from our affiliate kabc, showing this area, this mountainous area of big bear california where it's cold right now. so it's obviously a massive man hunt under way right now, but we are hearing once again that two deputies have been shot in this gunfight that apparently with christopher dorner that is continuing, but we don't have more information. casey wian is watchings what's going on. what else are you picking up casey. >> in that conversation i had with a law enforcement official just a couple of hours ago, one of the things that he brought up that was sort of surprising is despite dorner's military background, law enforcement background, this law enforcement source tells me that everyone who knew him at the lapd when he was an officer thought that this was very out of character for

him. and they have also gone through his military record, you mentioned that deployment, but dorner, according to the best law enforcement source they had have never killed anyone in his life, either as a law enforcement officer or as a member of the military. so these murders, these three killings that he is suspected of and one that he has been formally charged request, that police officer in riverside, california are completely out of character for dorner and that's taking even those that have been investigating him, involved in this man hunt very surprised that he would engage in this type of behavior. wolf. >> and i want to be precise, with what we know right now, what cnn has now independently confirmed, this coming from a law enforcement official with direct knowledge of the situation, there was a home invasion in this big bear area, this mountainous area, a lot of resort homes outside of los

angeles. there was a home invasion, a carjack in the big bear area, police got a description of the vehicle, they set up a road block. when dorner allegedly approached, he opened fire and in the process, he wounded two deputy sheriffs' officers, he is now supposedly pinned down somewhere in the area. all this coming from a law enforcement official with knowledge of the situation. once again we don't know what pinned down means, whether he is actually holed up someplace with his weapons or he is driving someplace, but we do know that there was a carjacking, so supposedly, he has a vehicle. chris welch, you're in big bear right now, are you seeing any of this activity from your location where you are? >> well, i can tell you i'm not seeing it, but i'm definitely hearing sirens go by every now and then and we're hearing helicopters and it sounds like they could be news helicopters, not positive at this point. but schools here in big bear

where we are are on lock down right now and just a few minutes ago, we heard from the public information officer that dorn ser is not in custody, and that could have changed and we are expecting a press release coming out in just a few minutes from now that will hopefully answer some of those unanswered questions. >> hopefully this will be over with soon. and this whole man hunt will have been resolved, we can only hope now, we are told he is allegedly pinned down somewhere in this big bear area, chris lawrence is our pentagon correspondent, tell ow our viewers here and -- when you talk about being pinned down right now, although you mentioned, you don't know exactly what that means and in what context, but i can tell you

some of the training he received was in weak side shooting. in his manifesto he claimed he was a crack shot. that was overstating the case by a long shot, but he did qualify as a marksman with the rifle and he qualified two levels higher,

expert, the highest level possible for an everyday sailor with the 9 millimeter and because he does have involvement with security operations with th this -- he is proficient, not as qualified as he makes himself out to be. but he's a good shot, wolf. >> we are now hearing that as he was approached allegedly, he opened fire and wounded two more deputy sheriff's officers here in the big bear area, so obviously what he's at the too much his class as far as a marksman is concerned that's probably irrelevant, he is well armed right now and he's fully ca capable of shooting people allegedly. that's what the fear is, that more of this could go under way. we're told he is pinned down in

that area, we don't know precisely where, these are picturing from the big bear area from our kabc affiliate. law enforcement officials got this initial tip and they went in this home that was burglarized, he stole a vehicle and he's now being pinned down somewhere. >> and something that is also critical is that we're getting conflicts reports that the sheriff's deputy who is apparently were injured have actually been taken out of the area, transported to a hospital or what have you, or if they're still somewhere there, we do know if a helicopter has been sent to the area, the question of course is whether that helicopter would be medevaced to get them out of there. we don't know the severity of the wounds of the two deputies

right now. it's still conflicting information as to whether these deputies are already on their way to medical attention. >> what we do know from a law enforcement official, there was a home invasion, allegedly by christopher dorner, there was a carjacking just within the past couple of hours, maybe within the last hour or so in the big bear area, police have a description of the vehicle. when dorner allegedly approached this road block, he opened fire, wounded two deputy sheriff's officers, we don't know their condition as joe is reporting right now, we don't know if they have been medevaced, we don't know what's going on on that front, but what we do know is that christopher dorner allegedly is pinned down somewhere in this area, the big bear, california area. in an abundance of caution, all the area schools are in lock down situation as well.

there can't be that many roads out of big bear, chris, so there's probably a limited number, you set up a few road blocks, and you can clear pin down someone, right? >> well, that's right, we have heard several reports that they have closed down these highways that he's allegedly on. i do want to give you one quick update before we go further, wolf, we are told just moments ago by the same public information officer that he is still not in custody, christopher dorner not in custody. that was just about a minute or two ago from the same spokeswoman here at to the san bernardino county sheriff's department. we're talking about conflicting reports, we are heard that he's pinned down, what does pinned down mean if he's not in custody. so it's somewhat of a cfusing situation.

>> we don't know if he's driving or if he has abandoned this vehicle he allegedly stole as a robbery in this home. he allegedly tied up two people in this home invasion. casey wian is getting more information as well. what else are you picking, casey. >> well, wolf, you talked about the number of roads in and out of that big bear area, and that's something that law enforcement has going for them. christopher dorner has remained one step ahead of law enforcement, in the words of one official that i talked to a little while ago for a week and a half now. but there are only three roads to the best of my knowledge, down from that mountain, the big bear area, so it should be fairly simple for law enforcement to seal that area off and prevent him from escaping. we don't know what his location

is right now, but it's not very likely that he's going to get off of that mountain other than in law enforcement custody or killed by law enforcement. >> let's hope no more law enforcement officials or anyone else is killed in this process. so just to be precise, he is not in custody, christopher dorner, we are told that two law enforcement, two local deputy sheriff's officers are have been wounded as part of this exchange, but once again, christopher dorner is not yet in custody, at least as far as we know right now. we do know that a massive man hunt is under way in this area. it's approaching, what, 2:00 p.m. there on the west coast. it's going to get dark at some point pretty soon. so this could get more complicated. >> reporter: it certainly could and it's going to be more complicated if this extends into

the evening for law enforcement and in fact for dorner if he is pinned down and alive, as you said, it's going to get cold up there in the big bear mountains, casey said a while ago, it is neighborhood of 20 degrees now, but once that sun drops and in those mountain communities, that sun's going to go down a lot sooner, the windchill factor over the last couple of days has been down below zero. so it's going to be very, very difficult without any sort of survival gear for dorner to stay alive in those conditions. it's also going to make the job of law enforcement a built more difficult in trying to get him into custody, wolf. >> we're iing smoke emerging, i have no idea what that smoke may be coming from, joe johns, you're watching it together with me, what does it look like to you? i have no idea what that could

be. >> i have no idea and i would be very worried to speculate on it right now. it appears to be at the end of some kind of driveway, it could be condensation, it could be fuel burnoff, any number of things. it could also be a flare, christopher dorner is known to be a very cagey guy, to have so many different kinds of threats, by air, land or sea, according to some accounts. certainly on land, he's a threat. it's been said that he carjacked a car. by sea, people have talked about him taking a boat, getting scuba equipment. there's even been speculation of him being able to fly a plane. there could be any number of explanations as we look at that smoke right now. >> we don't know if it's at all related to this massive man hunt for christopher dorner. chris welch, you're there in big

bear, i don't know if you have seen these pictures, do you have any idea what that smoke was? >> reporter: you know, i would take the same tag as joe johns, i would be hesitate to speculate on what that is at this point. there's a lot of confusion in the air at this point, but what we do know is that there has been a home invasion and a carjacking, i just want to reiterate what we know at this point, the police have a description of this vehicle, they have road blocks, poliyou t be able to hear some of the sirens, i can barely make out some of the sirens going by, in the distance behind a few sheds at this point. but obviously there's a lot of action going on right now. you're seeing the police cars and law enforcement vehicles parked on the side of the road, but again, we have reports that dorner opened fire and as you reported as, as we have all been

saying, he has wounded two deputy officers, he's allegedly pinned down someone in that area. we're still wait forgive that press release from a few moments ago, maybe five to seven minutes ago, we were still told that dorner was not in custody. whether that could change in the next few minutes, remains to be seen. >> it's the top of the hour right now, i just want to update our viewers what's going on, for those -- for our viewers who may just be tuning in, i'm wolf blitzer, we're here in "the situation room," watching what's going on in southern california right now, a massive, massive man hunt has been underway for days. i want to welcome our viewers in the united states and around the world to our breaking news coverage and we see a lot of activity right now. here's what we know. here's what cnn has independently confirmed, this rogue ex-lapd police officer christopher dorner, he is now believed to be pinned down in this area, in this big bear

mountainous area of southern california, he apparently has been involved in a shoot-out with deputies, this according to a high ranking official in connection with this -- the rogue lapd officer who was fired, formerly served in the united states navy, he had been sighted. he may have been involved in a robbery in the big bear area in a home. we believe that he took a car, he stole a car and that he is now allegedly pinned down, pinned down in the area. i think we have the mayor of to the city of big bear lake on the phone right now, mayor are you there? >> yes, i am, hello, wolf. >> thank you for joining us. i want to make sure that i'm pronouncing you're name correctly. sit obernolte?

>> yes, sir. he's pinned down in an area about eight miles to the south of big bear lake so we're happy that he no longer poses a threat to the residents here, but we have faith in the law enforcement community to deal with this situation, we're very happy that things are coming to a head finally. >> what have you been told by authorities about the circumstances that have led to this development? >> we have the same information i think you have about the carjacking and the home invasion, also, we have heard reports of several police officers wounded in an exchange of fire with the suspect and our thoughts and prayers are certainly with those officers. if they were injured in the defense of our community we owe them a huge debt of gratitude. >> we heard that two police officers were wounded, are you hearing more than two. >> no, two is the number we heard also. >> several sounded like more than two. is he pinned down, is he on the

move? is he in a house? do we have any idea when we say he's pinned down what that mean. >> i don't think i have any more updated information that you have, but the area where this is taking place is a very rural area, if he's there in that area, i don't believe he's in the house, he's seeking high ground. >> so he's in the forest out there in the mountains? >> i believe so, yes. >> so is this an area that can be cordoned off by authorities? is there a lot of escape routes? or is it pretty contained? >> there's been a substantial law enforcement presence out here for the last several days and they have been carefully monitoring every entrance and exit in and out of the big bear mountains. >> what have you been told about his weapons? how well armed is he? >> i don't have any information about that unfortunately. >> we have seen these smoke,

this smoke coming up. i don't know what it is, do you have any idea what the smoke has been? we have been showing our viewers from these aerial pictures, smoke coming up. do you know what that is? >> no, i do not. >> but this is an area, this is video that we how earlier, smoke in the area, that could be nothing, it could be something significant. do you know the condition, by the way, mayor, of these two officers that were shot by christopher dorner? >> i don't, but our thoughts and prayers are with them for their survival and a speedy recovery. >> i'm just being told mayor that the smoke is sort of a guide from local police, they're on the ground to helicopters where they want the helicopters to focus their attention because they system perhaps, perhaps that dorn sir in this area. so they're just sending a message down from below, so

those in police helicopters above can focus in on this area and help in this search. if in fact he has gotten out of that stolen vehicle, we believe we did steal a vehicle, mr. mayor and is on the run right now, you know this area well, is there a lot of area where is we potentially can hide? >> there are certain place he is can hide where we have faith in law enforcement personnel up here that he won't be able to hide for long. i think this is the break that we all van waiting for to get him flushed out and no longer in hiding. my opinion is that it's only a matter of time. >> and it's also an extremely dangerous situation if he's on the run right now and he's well armed with ammunition, god forbid, he could still injure and kill law enforcement who are in the search for him. >> yes, and we're certainly hoping that he can be captured or subdued without any more loss of life or injury to law enforcement personnel. >> you're the mayor of big bear

lake, what's been the mood over these past several days and what's been his connection to this area? why do you think he came to your part of southern california? >> certainly he's not the kind of tourist we want up there. we're very resill yeblt up here, we're used to dealing with forest fires and earthquakes and wild animals and so this is not something that's going to deter us and you know, i have been asked very frequently if there was panic here in our community and we really have not been panicked. i have been very impressed and happy with the response of our community. >> you have put the local schools, though, in a lockdown situation, the kids are all in their classrooms, locked down, is that right. >> yes, that's true right now, we did that just as a precaution, we did something similar when he was first discovered here in big bear. >> because they're supposed to go home, it's just after 2:00

p.m. in big bear right now, are you going to let them go home or are you going to keep them in a locked down situation? >> you're right, some of them will be scheduled to get out of school soon, i will imagine we would do what we did last week is not to run the school busses and to have parents come and big their children up. i don't know if that decision has been made, so if any parents are listening, i would encourage them to contact the school for further instructions. >> it would be wise to do. i'm sure a lot of parents nervous in light of what's going on. is there anything else you want to share with us before we let you go back to work. >> just how thankful we are for the law enforcement personnel that are up here, we recognize that they have taken time away from their busy lives and their families and they're putting themselves in harm's way as the events today have illustrated and we're so thankful for their protecting us.

joe johns has one question, go ahead, joe. >> you have to wonder if there are a lot of hiking trails and/or horse trails, that type of thing that people would be able to maneuver between and among the trees and the rows. are there a lot of hiking trails and horse trails where a guy like this might be able to get away? >> in that area, there are a few, but that's not where they're concentrated because it's eight miles from the community and most of the trails are concentrated closer to big bear, so there are a few. but i have faith in the law enforcement effort at this point w the aerial aspect that they have and all of the boots that they have on the ground, it would be, i would think, and this is completely a nonexpert opinion, but i think it would bhbe highly unlikely that he would be able to get away. >> jay obernolte is the mayor of

big bear lake, he's got his hands full in this situation. let's go back to casey wians who's watching what's going on, he's in los angeles. >> well, wolf, the mayor talked about the air assets that are being deployed right now in the search for dorner and the effort to subdue him. the faa has just posted a notice called tfr, temporary flight restrictions for a three-mile area around the community of big bear to provide for safe law enforcement activities. they will not confirm for the record that it is related to the dorner situation but it is pretty cler that that's what it must be. there are air assets that are being deployed right now to try to find him and stop him. also my colleague photo journalist tom larsen tells me that he saw several command type vehicles leaving lapd headquarters in a very rapid manner, so it seems clear that

the lapd brass is going to be on its way to that big bear area and they'll be there, in a couple of hours, i would imagine, wolf. >> i hope they resolve this before it gets dark because obviously at that point it's going to become even more complicated than it already s casey hold on for a moment. tom fuentes is here us as well. what does it means when we say this individual, christopher done is pinned down? >> that term usually means that he's not running anymore, that he's not in a position of flight, they've got him trapped in a home or some physical location that he's not free to go. that would mean he's contained, that doesn't mean he's in custody, they'll say that when he's in custody, but it means he's no longer free to be running loose. >> it also mean it's a very, very dangerous situation when

he's shot and wounded two police officers as part of this exchange that's occurred within the past hour or, so he's obviously still very well armed and he's a markman, s this is still a very dangerous situation. >> yes, it is. this area is sparsely populated, but it is not unpopulated so he could be in one of those buildings right now holding a family hostage and basically setting himself up as a hostage taker and barricaded with subjects which makes this a very difficult situation and could cause it to even become a protracted crisis as opposed to ending in a shoot-out if they have got him in a place where he's by himself. >> if he know this is area well, and has been there on many occasions, which we suspect he has, which is why he went there to begin with, will make it even more complicated. >> it would have been

complicated up to this point, but if he is in fact as describeded pinned down, his knowledge of the terrain doesn't matter anymore, he's not going anywhere. that's normally the -- whether he's in a building or in a ravine or a trench or some other defensive position, we don't know that right now, but the term means -- usually as its used means he's no longer running, they've got him located, they've got him contained and not in a position to go run away again and escape again, that doesn't moon that he's not in somebody's home holding hostages. >> we know that federal, local, state law enforcement, a lot of people are involved in this man hunt. how do they coordinate who does what. >> the coordination is very difficult. in this case the federal assistance is provided only on the assumption that he would have left california and either gone to another state or left the country and that's why the

marshall's service had obtained unlawful flight to obtain prosecution warrant, which would make a local fugitive a federal fugitive. but now as he's pinned down as they're saying in california, then this reverts back, the local police are in charge and in this case san bernardino sheriff's office will have the lead in trying to apprehend him with the assistance of other agencies, state, county and federal. but again, the local police have the charge, the murder charges that have been placed in the other cities, and it's a local matter. >> and based on your experience, tom, and you're retired from the fbi, in a situation like this, let's say you have a marksman, a former navy, a navy marksman, a former lapd cop who is well trained, experienced 33 years old, a big guy.

who has the most experience, who's best trained to find someone like this? would it be local, state, federal? what do you think. >> all of the above, i mean all of the agencies have extended training for their tactical units, their negotiating teams so really the expertise is at all levels, the fbi would certainly have it, the los angeles place, riverside county, riverside police, the other departments that have been named would have tactical units capable of taking this guy on. so i don't think there would be a worry in that sense that it has to be one federal agency or one state or federal agency versus another, you know, if they have got him in some kind of contained situation, he's going to be, you know, it's going to be very difficult, it's going to depend, though, whether they learn that he's alone and therefore is just the barricaded subject, which will be much easier to deal with, or whether he has hostages which is a much

more difficult thing which as we saw in the case of -- >> the only thin we do know based on our reporting from local law enforcement agencies is that he's pinned down in this area, in the big bear mountainous area outside of los angeles. chris cuomo, our newest cnn reporter is joining us in our reporting of what's going on. clearly, chris, this is a very tense moment in the big bear area, two police officers have been shot and injured over the past hour or so as this exchange has gone on. >> this has ever layer of a trajic situation when you're dealing with it from a law enforcement perspective. one we know he has a history, he's killed officers, he's shot others, they understand his tactical response. the second layer after their history is their acknowledge of current risk, they don't know if this robbery or burglary in this house where they were trying to access a vehicle, tie up a

couple like they were reporting earlier, we don't know. and all this tactical response, we're not sure. >> chris welch is in big bear, he's getting more information, chris, what else are you learning? >> reporter: we literally just received a new press release from the sheriff's department here in san bernardino. i'm going to go through this, it sort of outlines the timeline of what they say happened here. they first received a call of a stolen vehicle. and the party who reported the stolen vehicle said the suspect took their vehicle and described him as looking very similar to christoph christopher dorner. they say police started looking for this vehicle in that area. the suspect fled into the forest and barricaded himself inside a cabin, they say, a short time later there was an exchange of

gun fire between law enforcement and the suspect, they added that the sheriff's s.w.a.t. team is onscene and they recon firmed that two law enforcement officers are being air lifted with unknown injuries. they're saying they'll continue to update us, but this again from the sheriff's department here in san bernardino. >> so basically what we know right now is as we speak, he is inside, he's barricaded himself inside a cabin and we believe the sheriff's s.w.a.t. team, i suppose has surrounded this cabin right now and that's what's going on? >> reporter: yes, both people from the public information office said they're not positive whether he's inside the house or outside the house when they say they have him pinned down, that's the phrase we have been using on the air. but they're sure he is still armed, they're not sure how heavily armed, but he is still armed. they're not sure of the condition that the woman,

they're saying this is a woman who called in, or excuse me, this information is apparently no good anywhere else. i will retract what i just said, we don't have any information about any kind of a woman at the house at this point. but i will say that i want to add that the smoke that we have been talking about, i think we have already sort of established in on our own, but the smoke is not a fire, but it is from a smoke bomb that was detonated to show other law enforcement official where is the scene is located, wolf. >> stand by for a moment, chris is here, chris cuomo is watching what else is going on right now, chris this is clearly a very dangerous moment right now. >> this is a plus-minus situation, you have him in a contained area, but you have tactical know how, a -- someone who understands this situation very well, bill bratton is on the phone with us right now. commissioner, thank you very much for joining us, what's your understanding of this type of situation, the risk involved and what procedures must be in

place? >> the good news is they have him in a contained situation versus over the last week not even knowing where he is over a very large geographic area, so that certainly is a big head start for law enforcement, it's still daylight out there, so it gives them an opportunity to visually see the area where they have to control and deal with. and time is now on their side, while he reports and others that he's continuing to shoot at them, where he is contained that officer's safety is going to be first and foremost, he has already shot and killed one officer, wounded four others, they don't wanted any other additional officers hurt if they can help it. if he does not have hostages and i'm not sure of anything at all to that effect that makes the tactical or strategic situation.

there's time on their side, to do this in a very calculated way. >> that's the big consideration, right? once you figure out the hostages, commissioner, you're able to assess how many time is on your side, right? because they can determine that he's alone right there, there's really no rush to do anything s that fair. >> exactly, the idea being -- that gifts him opportunity to tell the shooters where the gun fire is coming from. they can go on for hours upon hours, that they are going to do everything in their power not to put any officer's lives at risk unnecessarily to get this character. >> commissioner, this is wolf blitzer, we're watching what's going on in "the situation room" as well. we are now showing our viewers videotape of the aerial area

after the law enforcement asking us to no longer show pictures as that could help the suspect in his escape. while we're showing videotape, we're not going to show the live pictures because that could endanger the operation. don't remember a time when a -- national broadcast to stop aerial shots if you l live pictures because it could endanger the operation. what does that say to you, commission never? >> well, it's not unprecedent, we have done that in the past in l.a., certainly during my time as chief where the area's usually overflowing with news helicopters. no this is all about speculation that he has access to a television in that cabin and they don't want to take the chance of effectively giving away to the target of the operation moves they're making.

he is a trained police officer, he has the additional benefit of military training, so he is well aware of some of the moves that are going to be made against him and they're just looking to lessen the visibility that he has to those moves. so you should appreciate, i'm glad that the media is seemingly complying with that request because you don't want to be involved and putting additional officers at risk as they begin surrounding that cabin closing in on this individual. >> sheriff, commissioner mcmahon, has asked that all the helicopters pull back or leave the area of barricaded suspect, keyword barricaded suspect. gun fire is being exchanged between law enforcement and the suspect, and then the san bernardino sheriff says your personnel are in danger could contribute as well to officer safety on the ground and he thanks all the news media for cooperation. so that's a significant request.

and we have learned that this individual, the suspect we believe to be christopher dorner has been barricaded in this area. so commissioner, they know where he is, so do they just wait him out? is that what you're suggesting? >> in terms of each one of these situations has different characteristics to it. first off appreciate that the san bernardino sheriff will be in charge of this operation while the incident involved the los angeles police department and began with the activities directed against them, they would be in a support role up there that they were officers support assistance, but the operation is under the control of the local sheriff, so it needs to be that understanding. in the sense of him actively shooting at them, they will understandably attempt to position their people, their snipers to basically return that fire appropriately when they are

able to identify where he is shooting from when he shoots. if he ceases to shoot at them, they will not be shooting at him unless they get the sniper opportunity. but the idea is time is now on their side. there is no need to unnecessarily risk additional officers while they now have him apparently in a very contained situation. where he went from being the hunted to now he is the -- he's gone from being the hunter where he is now the hunted and they have run him under ground. so what is a national search is now focused on a cabin in bear mountain, california. >> and commissioner, we're dealing with some other built in information also, i have learned from you in the past, that we don't want to give the suspects any more attention, we don't want to glorify them, but there is an element here of what dorner put out, you were

mentioned in it, he had specific reasons for his goals and intentions, forget the reasons for those goals and intentions, how does that play into what you do certainly tactically knowing who's out there looking for him. >> the reality is that this individual is a murderer. i don't care what his motivations are, he is still in a position to kill public safete news reports, that there doesn't appear to be civilian lives at risk, it appears to be him and law enforcement. so a lot of the hoopla for the last several days on facebook and people coming out of the wood work supporting him, first and foremost, we have to remember that this is a n nondangerous felon who is attempting to kill more people. so any attention -- i can't imagine why anyone else would, no matter what his in his own

mind his motivations are. we can work that out after this is resolved. but allowing that to color any part of this discussion of the state of the situation, i think is unfortunate. there is no motivation for going out and murdering innocents and murdering police officers. i'm sorry, i just -- i see no justification, and certainly no justification in terms of his motives. >> well said, indeed commissioner. we are now being told that in addition to this request from the local san bernardino sheriffs, that local helicopters have pull eed back and left thi area, question are now being told that the faa itself has issued a temporary flight restriction around the big bear area, so they clearly don't want hektd ors small planes or anyone else flying over, they want law enforcement to be flying over, checking what's going on, but they don't want the media for

example to be interfering with this operation, commissioner, so you think you have heard of this before, this kind of activity? these kinds of requests from local authorities as well as from the faa? >> for example, what's occurred in los angeles for example during every event at dodgers stadium, there's going on the an air restriction over the stadium that's a counter terrorism situation, but something else to consider with this wolf, in addition to the concerns of tactical operations and tactical safety on the ground, with the gun fire that this individual is capable of projecting out of that cabin, as well as that might come from the law enforcement community that there is the potential risk of air ships in the air being struck by that and this gentleman is by all accounts, a skill eed marksn and if he still has long gun capabilities, there would be nothing to stop him from taking

shots at your chopper ors police officer choppers in the sky. so there's a safety element and concern for your air ships as well as a tactical concern about not broadcasting what's on the ground as far as the police operations. >> obviously a very, very dangerous situation. hold off for a moment if you can because brian todd is getting more information as well. what else are you picking up, brian? >> reporter: i just spoke with chief kurt ellington, he is in los angeles right now monitoring the situation on the ground and communicating with officers there, he confirms that the suspect christopher dorner is holed up in a cabin in the town of mentone, california. chief ellington did give me the cross streets and a fairly precise location. we are not giving that information right now, but chief kurt ellington has confirmed that they have the suspect holed

up in a cabin in the town of mentone. he said that dorner is contained a cabin, that's the phrase he used. he is contained a cabin with law enforcement officers on the scene, wolf, we'll try to get more information in a bit. >> stand by, chris, if he's got hostages inside, that makes the situation clearly a lot more dangerous? >> it changes everything and obviously it's not just a immediate yeah vent, it's a very active investigation that's why you have to give the sheriff's helicopters their room. there is a safety consideration, as commissioner bradley was saying, he has long guns. they have to assess the situation on the ground very differently. we don't know their priorities so we have to pick at the edges as to what may or may not be going on. let's go to randi kay, she's out there close tore the situation than we are. >> reporter: as this news start

unfold, i was just in an interview with a former lapd psychologist and we were talking about the dorner case of course for a story. as i started to leave, he said no question this is the end for him and this is what he wanted. he also told me that it was a big mistake for christopher dorner, he believed, to stay in big bear mountain, it was a big mistake for him to burn his truck there as well. the question is as we discussed, why didn't he harm this family that he was with? and the answer from this psychologist was, that he has his very specific targets and he certainly wasn't going to go after them, certainly he wanted them to care for him. we were there earlier in the week, it was down to 19 degrees and without a truck, without any transportation, who knows what it might have been like for him to travel around there. what's interesting is that the search has been expanding as far as going to more remote areas of

big bear mountain for him in the last few days, but they have been cutting back on law enforcement, they have gone from 125 officers searching for christopher dorner, to just 30 officers as of yet, but i can tell you, the fact that he's contained as some have said, certainly will bring great relief to the 50 or so families that are currently being protected by law enforcement here. those -- with 50 families under protection, a greet sense of relief. we know that even police who ride on motorcycles are now being told to get in cars because it wasn't safe for them. one police, captain crisp hasn't left his home since this man hunt began, he has wife and six children. so certainly it's not over yet. >> we're getting more information and i want bill bratton, the former lapd police

chief, the former nypd police chief as well to stand by because casey wian is out in the area trying to get more information, what else are you learning, casey? >> well, wolf, we have looked at this news release from the san bernardino sheriff's office where they describe where dorner allegedly stole that vehicle and then where the vehicle was found, the address where he stole that vehicle 1200 club view in that area, which looking on a map is very, very close to the big bear ski resort so. we don't know if it was from a resident or someone who was perhaps parked and skiing. the vehicle was found 27 miles away heading down the mountain at highway 38 and grass road and he is now said to be holed up in a cabin in the mentone area, that is all down the mountain, so it is very clear that what he was trying to do is get down that mountain and escape into

the greater basin of southern california into the san bernardino area, and who knows where from beyond there. but he actually went between the time that he stole that vehicle and the vehicle was found 27 miles around the peak of the mountain there at big bear, wolf. >> hold on for a moment, because i want bill bratton to explain something to us, if you have a second, bill bratton, the former lapd police chief, a bunker buster unit, a sw.w.a.t. team i approaching the area, what exactly does that mean? i don't know if bill bratton is still with us, the former lapd chief. but it obviously is a source of concern because there are other reports that there may be hostages in this situation as well. >> and the developing situation, what happens wolf is they bring all available assets that could potentially be useful.

we have brought in other s.w.a.t. teams, they bring in heavy equipment that can come up and literally blow into spaces. that would be the obvious type of procedure if you wind up having this mana alone, however san bernardino police are coming out with the fact that there may be hostages, you must err on the side of safety because there's protection of human life. we're not showing live images on the request of local stories in case cnn is being watched at this time and we're going to heed that and the faa restriction, but to paint the picture of how we got to this point, we're going to play some sound from kcbs a local reporter who was on the scene when this investigation was in its formative stages, let's listen to that right now.

>> that eet's a harrowing sound. that's confusing because we don't understand. what do we know from what we were hearing right this. >> we know there were volleys of gun fire going around, we know that officers were hit, we know they have been air lifted to help them to get to emergency medical services. but you have to remember, you're in a remote situation, tactics and advantages all come into play here because you have weather conditions, you have visibility issues, if that man is barricaded, clearly that came -- but if nothing else, it gives us this sense of the emergency of this situation. this a man again, no matter how

diluted his ideas of fairness may b he is trained, he does have an arsenal of 30 weapons, many semi-automatic, andmore importantly, he's spent a lot of time learning how to use them. so fuelled with what's obviously his own delusions, he's gone into the woods and the officers are n are -- >> he's got hostages and i want to recap for the viewers who might be tuning in right now, this all went down within the past two hours or so. the san bernardino sheriff's department said that about 12:00 p.m. local time, officers were working in the big bear area, they were looking for christopher dorner. they responded to a report of a stolen vehicle, in the 1200 block of club view drive.

the deputies immediately began a search on the ground and from the air for the vehicle. the vehicle was then located highway 38 and glass road. the suspect fled into the forest, barricaded himself inside a cabin. short time later, there was an exchange between law enforcement and the suspect, sheriff's s.w.a.t. teams are on the scene, two law enforcement officers, according to the san bernardino sheriff's department are being air lifted to a local hospital with unknown injuries and they say more information will be coming. so we know he's barricaded in a cabin, we don't know who is inside, if anyone is inside that cabin. we do know that there are a lot of s.w.a.t. teams and other personnel, chris on the ground. >> i just got on e-mail from someone who works in tactical warfare and he makes a very instructive point. they train for how to deal with these types of situations in law enforcement, but not necessarily against one of their own. they assume a level of

ignorance, a they assume a level of being haphazard in your reactions. this is very different, because again while the man may be well diseased, he knows they know what that do in this situation, he is obviously very capable with the weapon. in terms of the psychology of this man and what he may be thinking or not, i think at this point it's irrelevant, at this point all we want is for him to be stopped. >> local law enforcement and state and federal law enforcement, they see christopher dorner as a killer, he has already killed three people, two more officers have been injured, have been would bed in this latest exchange of gun fire. we're told that there will be an lapd news conference in about 20 minutes and we'll of course have live coverage of that. >> and if he is pinned down in

this house, the next step would be to try to establish communication with him to start some kind of negotiation, to see if he has any demands, if there's anything they can do to get him to come out of that building. so, the question now will be, if he's in that building by himself, can you get some type of a microphone, a radio, a telephone, something, some way to communicate with him and at least open up the discussion of getting him to surrender. >> and chris, we have to assume, if he is barricaded in a cabin there, in this mountainous area, big bear lake, outside of los angeles, about a two-hour drive from los angeles, we assume he has access to local television or cable television, he can watch what's going on right now, that's why authorities wanted to -- wanted all the media helicopters basically to go away. >> sure. i mean look, at the end of the day, we're looking at a picture right now of the area where this is taking place, regardless of what the current activity s he

has gotten into a situation where he can be controlled. the only outstanding issue that matters to minute is there anybody inside with him. of course establishing communication would be important if there are 4hostages inside. but if he's in there by himself, there's no reason to engage too quickly. >> criasey, do you know, has the been any definitive word about whether there's hostages. >> i don't have any definitive word about that, it's clearly a possibility, given the fact that there's, you know, this exchange of gun fire and he's holed up somewhere, and i don't have any confirmation of that, perhaps in less than 20 minutes, there was a regularly scheduled news conference that's going to take place here at lappd.

as we have been reporting at 12:30 or so local time, 3:30 eastern time, there was a report of a stolen vehicle in the big bear area, we now know that that location, very near the entrance, parking lot of the big bear ski resort. that vehicle was tied to christopher dorner, the vehicle was found 27 miles down the mountain toward the more populated areas of southern california. dorner now said to be holed up in a residence further down the mountain. we are not showing live pictures of that residence because law enforcement has asked us not to, both for the safety of the helicopters that were in the area and for the safety of law enforcement officers because just as of a few minutes ago, that advisory saying gunshots were still being exchanged,

wolf. >> casey, we're just getting this in from the los angeles times, very disturbing word that is he is holed up in a cabin, he's bln in this cabin, he's barricaded in this cabin and he is holding a couple hostage, very disturbing information, just coming in from the los angeles times, saying there is a couple being held hostage in this cabin. tom fuentes, you're a former assistance fbi director, if in fact he is holding a couple hostage and cnn has not independently confirmed that, this is a report coming from the los angeles times, it obviously makes this situation extremely dangerous. >> that's true, wolf, it's worst-case scenario if he has hostages because that means he can fire out of that cabin but the police can't fire back unless they have an absolute clear shot by a sniper and he's going to be too smart to expose himself that wachy. and in fact he could use the people as human shields and in fact force one of them to stick

their head out a door or window and take a shot at a police officer by accident. the problem here will be how can they get communication to him, if that cabin does not already have telephone or any kind of communication access out, that means the police will have to physically try to approach it to bring a phone or some communication method to him. otherwise they're going to have to hide behind a tree and be shouting at each other to see what he wants or what he wants to do next. it's a very difficult situation, we're not going to get a lot of information until there's some communication established between negotiators and him. >> chris cuomo, thank you for joining us. god forbid there are hot stajs in this cabin with this man. we have to hope against hope that, he only stays alive as long as they do. if there's any gross indication that he takes the lives of those

who might be with him, hopefully there is no one with him. that is the end of his life as well. let me ask you this, mr. fuentes, the kind of severe, immediate, go with malice type tactics using instrumentation like your flash bang to stun who's inside, you can do this procedurally very quickly if you no he's alone, yes? >> yes, a barricade of a subject is a much easier scenario to resolve because you're in charge then, you have all the assets to know that you have -- give him the assets to sure republican der, and after that you'll give him other mets to try to smoke him out or vetting him out of there. and you don't have to play any more games with him. >> but two more things are going on right now, because right now we're assuming they're in a paused state, because number one, they don't have the assets for an immediate response right

now, or they're waiting and if they're waiting, we have to assume that they're waiting for good because they he's not alone. it's hard to read into a situation like this, but you can make lots of decisions on the ground especially if you know where the suspect is. >> the police officers have everything on the ground they need if a disposal was needed or came to that. but they're not going to endanger other innocent people thachlt have to determine positivery that he doesn't have anyone in that cabin with him. if he doesn't then it's a much easier situation to resolve. >> let's assume that dorner is barricaded in this cabin. let's assume that he does have a couple that's being held hostage, but let's assume that he does have access to the news media, he can listen to reports of the news media, television or

whatever, that further complicates the situation, you've been on the law enforcement side of this when a lot of media are reporting what's going on. >> the assumption is that he probably can hear the media, that was the assumption in the dykes case in atlanta last week, it's the asump thun -- in this case you would have the faa issue an order for all nonlaw enforcement helicopters, fixed wing aircraft, any other aircraft to be out of the air space devoted entirely to law enforcement so you won't have any live pictures of the scene from media being broadcast. at that point, even if he's watching it, people like me are going to watch what we say, every detail of what's tactically possible wouldn't be reveal revealed except in this case you're dealing with a former police officer. so if we have someone who's not

familiar with law enforcement tactics, particularly in a crisis response mode, it's much more important not to reveal that this is what the negotiators do, this is what the s.w.a.t. team might do, you don't want to conduct an education for someone who's ignorant. but in this case you have a trained law enforcement officer trained by one of the best police forces in the world, and military experience on top of that, so i don't think it's going to be as critical that he'll know that there's negotiators going to be there trying to establish communication, yes, there's going to be snipers deployed to have continuous observation of that cabin, once it's determined that it would be possible to do it, if they want to pursue that route. i think all the elements that are available in a tactical response like this, he would be aware of what could be done, what he won't know is what will

be done and what the sheriff has decided to do as the onscene commander at that particular location. >> right now we do know that he's barricaded in that cabin, we don't know if there are hostages inside, but we do know that a lot of law enforcement is in the area and presumably surrounded, won't be able to get out, this is going to continue, though, under an abundance of caution, isn't that right, tom? >> that's correct, until they determine that's there no hostages, it has to do. and this could be a long time situation, while that's in progress, so that's what they're trying to determine now, and hopefully they'll be able to determine, you know, without too much time going by so that it can be resolved. >> let's take a step back so that we can learn a new development here, hopefully it's a positive one, we don't know what's going on on the ground burks there's been little debate

as to what this man's ultimate grievance was, but this is a beautiful message to those out there, we know that when we investigated what happened with t he blathered about online in his so-call manifesto, that really manifested no true ideals, that there was no cause to believe what he had said. we now know something else. we thought he would be able to do certain things, wolf. he thought that he would be able to outsmart and used a lot of grandiose language. now he is holed up like an animal in a small cabin, because in truth, he was not able to do anything but hide, and not even that well. so hopefully the message in that is certainly this man is nothing like what he presented himself to be. the best-case scenario now is that he is alone in this cabin, and if he has one rational sense left in his mind, he will give himself up to authorities. so we know all of that, that led us to this point. because there's been so much intrigue surrounding this man and who he is and why this happened. and so many in law enforcement, including mr. fuentes, have made

a very instructive point. when you say their name, when you talk about their motivations, it gives credence and it gives a validity to somebody who doesn't really deserve it, like the commissioner said, bill bratton, he's nothing but a murderer. and he killed some of the people we fall most, those who protect and serve. and at least now for those tuning in, as you see through the stanchones of the helicopter there, we're going around an area in northern california where a suspect, who's been trying to kill police officers, shot some today, is now holed up in a cabin. we believe this has been his hideout. we do not know if he is lalone n the cabin. that is the major concern at this time. we know a blended team of local, state, and federal authorities are on this scene. that's the good news. there are a lot of assets in place. and they believe they have the man they've been hunting for for days pinned down in cabin. but, again, we do not know the situation inside that house. we do know there's been a lot of gunfire from a man who we

believe, through authorities, has an arsenal at his disposal. so, wolf, for right now, we just have to watch. >> and tom fuentes, we have to assume the worst-case scenario. we donate know. we don't know whether or not there are hostages being held inside, but from the perspective of law enforcement, you have to assume the worst case, right? >> exactly. you assume the worst-case. and if i could add something else that makes this very unique for u.s. law enforcement, i ran organized crime investigations all over the world and we've had the mafia in other countries, the cartels in latin america make a common practice to kill family members of law enforcement or officials of the government or media. this is something new here. this whole entire incident started with him murdering michelle quan and her fiance, the daughter of a police officer or a retired los angeles police officer. that's not quite unprecedented, but it's very, very rare to have something like that happen,

where the family members of law enforcement officials almost become the primary target to terrorize the police and to make a point. we've just not had that in this country. and we've had some of the worst gansters on the face of the earth operate in the united states and be tracked down by a number of law enforcement agencies, at every level, and it's very rare that we've ever had law enforcement families under siege like in this case. >> anderson cooper is joinings us in this continuing coverage, the search for this christopher dorner, this former lapd rogue cop, former navy sailor, a marksman, if you will. we believe he is barricaded, anderson, in a cabin. we don't know if there are hostages inside, but we do know lots of law enforcement, including s.w.a.t. teams, have surrounded this entire area. >> and there's been a lot of, you know, belief over the last couple of days, there's really no other way that this could have ended, the fact that he is still in this area is a sign that law enforcement was absolutely right in

concentrating in this area. as you know, his truck was last seen burned out several days ago. there hadn't been any word from him for several day, as some had thought maybe he froze to death out in the woods. but it seems clear, and there's an "l.a. times" report now that he had actually taken a couple hostage, previously, in a cabin somewhere, which is kind of one of the theories that had been out there for a long time, that he must have gotten shelter somewhere and basically been holed up, watching television, perhaps, just kind of biding his time, making his plans. it does seem, and you can correct me if i'm wrong on this, but it does seem this is a different house than the one he had been holed up, according to the "l.a. times," that after this shoot-out with law enforcement that happens just a short time ago, he basically had to gain access to another house, and that's really why we donate kn know if there are any hostages -- >> and in that shoot-out, anderson, two police officers were wounded and they are being medevaced right now to a hospital. and we don't know their condition. that underscores how dangerous

the situation continues to be. >> s.w.a.t. team definitely en route. this whole entire area is obviously now being cordoned off, a lot of units being moved into place around this, and, you know, it was a very active gunfight, from what we heard. >> and chris qcuomo is here. we're showing video taken earlier, not live pictures anymore. >> law enforcement reached out to us, anderson, right before you got here saying two things. one, we need to have our police helicopters close to the scene, don't get in our way. secondarily, you could be fired upon. if he does have long small weapons capability, you could be hit at that range. so for safety reasons, move. the faa picked up on that warning. the media immediately started to heed it, anyway, to move away, at the request of law enforcement, and at that point, we stopped using a live feed, no matter what it says on your screen, we're using things that are earlier, because we want to give the law enforcement their space. we're waiting on reports of what

happe happens. obviously, our knowledge is very secondary to the authorities doing what they have to do in this situation, which is hopefully making this stop as soon as possible. >> there's certainly also the concern that if he is in a house, he's able to access television, you don't want a situation where he's able to watch live the events and what law enforcement is doing. it's a situation we saw during the munich hostage crisis during the olympics, where the hostage takers were actually watching the television coverage, the live television coverage, were able to see authorities moving in. so these are all taped mores. >> and the announcement from the faa announcing what they call these temporary flight restrictions. they've cited special security reasons. no flying around, small planes, big planes, helicopters, nothing in the area right now. that's why we're showing our viewers the videotape that was taken earlier. joining us on the phone is kurt madden from the bear valley unified school district. mr. madden, thanks very much for coming in. what can you tell us about what's going on in bear valley?

>> well, our small little pristine ski community has been on edge over the past couple of days. i got word of some information from my contacts at about 12:30 this afternoon that there was a problem in a community called moon ridge, just a few miles, you know, from our district office, and typically, we hear sirens and things go by, because when we have accidents on the mountains with skiers or snowboarders, that's very common, but this for some reason just caught my ear, and it was just a matter and 60 seconds later we got a text message, there was a problem in moon ridge. so we decided to go ahead and put our schools that were near moon ridge into a lockdown, and we had a high school, an elementary school, and a continuation school. and as we learned more about the chase, we have a small elementary school, probably about 35 miles away. they are still on lock down right now, because they're the school that's in closest

probatiximity of where the susp currently is. >> so i assume the parents can't even come to the schools to take their children out. and right at the top of the hour, lapd will have an update, a news conference to update us on what we know. go ahead, mr. madden. tell us about whether or not the parents could get their kids and bring them home. >> what we decided at about 2:15 our time, about 45 minutes ago, based on the information that we have from law enforcement, that our schools were really out of danger. so we lifted the lockdowns that our parents could pick up and our buses went out to get our students. at the same time, our small school down in this area, which is about ten miles away, they're still on lockdown. and keep in mind, the roads are all closed, so you can't do a lot of transporting down there, but we're in contact with that school and they're in good shape. they're very calm, they're very experienced, they're very, very tough people and they'll do everything they can to keep our students safe. >> good luck over there, kurt

madden from the bear valley unified school district. good luck to everyone in that area. let's hope this situation is resolved very, very quickly and without any more injuries or death. anderson, we're getting ready for a news conference. >> that's right, wolf. chris and i are waiting for a news conference to take place, we believe right at the top of the hour, about one minute or so from now. los angeles police are going to give what information they can at this point. be very curious to hear exactly what the situation is, if they know the exact cabin that he's in, what the situation is inside that cabin, if they're aware whether or not there are hostages. that's the key question at this moment. are there other people inside that house that would really determine how police react and how police interact with him. whether they are able to or have been able to establish some sort of contact with him, if he's in that house. if they've been engaged in an active firefight, obviously, they want to try to engage in some sort of contact, but that can be a very risky proposition. >> let me just reset. we're approaching the top of the hour. we're following the breaking

news out of southern california right now. bear valley, the mountain area, about a two-hour drive outside of los angeles. we're watching the hunt, the massive manhunt underway and it's reaching a critical moment right now. we're told that this individual, the suspect, christopher dorner is inside a cabin. he has barricaded -- we're watching what's going on here in "the situation room." i'm wolf blitzer. once again, we want to welcome our viewers here in the united states and around the world. anderson cooper is here in "the situation room." chris cuomo is here as well. chris, as we await the news conference, i think there's a limit to what law enforcement is going to be able to tell us right the now, since this is clearly a very ongoing situation, a very dangerous situation. >> absolutely, wolf, and let's be honest. that's not what matters. what matters is the authorities are doing everything they can. anderson and i are sharing reporting here from a tactical expert who's telling us there's very well cause for a scramble right now on the part of law enforcement. why? visibility issues. darkness is coming there. they're in a remote area.

they'll have to set up nighttime perimeter for vision. they have tactics and assets that will allow them to discern if somebody's in the home. infrared scanners and things like that, but they're a little limited because they're looking at proximity. this is a secure vehicle from earlier on, but they have vehicles like that that can allow them to get closer and send a message to people inside that they have serious assets. but right now, wolf, may well be time of the essence for authorities to set up for darkness and make sure that there can't be escape. make sure that they are in the best position. and that's what matters most, not what we know about the situation. >> chris mentioned infrared, that's been one of the difficulties. the weather has really not been cooperating with authorities, especially several days ago, a storm system moving in. they had air assets in place, with infrared cameras, but they weren't able to get those choppers in the air in order to try to make the most of the tracking abilities that they had, but clearly, on the ground now, they are able to focus on this one house, if that's where

they have him cornered. >> you're looking on the left part of your screen, the microphones there set up in los angeles. we're expecting to hear from the lapd spokesman, andy niemann, who's going to be going to those microphones and updating us on what he can tell us. i'm sure there will be limits on what he can say. we are also, anderson, being told that the two sheriff deputies who were wounded, injured in this latest shoot-out within the past couple of hours, allegedly with christopher dorner have been airlifted to the loma linda medical center, this according to the sheriff's spokeswoman. but we have no update on their condition. we just know that two more sheriff deputies have been injured, have been wounded in this gunfire exchange, allegedly with christopher dorner. >> and the initial report seems to indicate that they were actually separate -- they weren't together at the time, there were actually separate incidents, physically separate from each other, and that's when they were injured in this shoot-out. again, you see authorities now walking towards the microphones. so we should be hearing very

shortly the latest that they're at least willing to divulge. >> and we assume, chris, they're going to also be answering reporters' questions. we'll hear what they have to say. it's interesting that this is the lapd, but san bernardino sheriffs, they're really two hours away, but obviously, the lapd has a huge, huge interest, since christopher dorner's a former lapd cop. >> also, it's all family at this point. state, local, municipal, federal. everybody's working together, as tom fuentes, the former fbi guy said to us early on, they are north used to dealing with somebody with this type of tactical know-how. certainly one of their own. he made a point to us that this type of domestic terrorism of cop on cop is almost unprecedented. so, of course, the authorities are taking this personally. and we'll see what they have to tell us. >> let's listen in. >> good afternoon, everyone. i'm commander andrew smith. i'm the commanding officer of media relations and community affairs group for the los angeles police department. this is our daily 3:00 press briefing. i have a very small amount of information i can provide to you

from what's happening up in san bernardino county right now. this information is from the san bernardino county sheriff's office, so let me put a caveat on it that this is very early, very preliminary information. today at about 12:22 p.m., san bernardino sheriffs were in the hunt for christopher dorner up in the big bear area. they received a call of a stolen vehicle in the 1,221200 block o club view drive. when they responded there, they received information from the person reporting that this stolen vehicle was stolen by an individual that appeared to be very similar to christopher dorner. they immediately conducted a ground and an air search for this vehicle and they were able to locate it at highway 38 and glass road, where the suspect in the vehicle fled into the forest. shortly thereafter, this individual barricaded himself in one of the cabins there and an exchange of gunfire occurred. during that exchange of gunfire, two officers were injured. they've been airlifted to a local hospital. right now their condition is

unknown. the los angeles police department has sent resources out to the san bernardino county airport. our resources are waiting there for authorization from the san bernardino county sheriff's to assist them. so this is a san bernardino county sheriff's investigation. this is their lead. they have the incident command out there. we are there to support them, only if asked. that is as much as i have on that particular incident out there. a quick update on how the search is going from the jric and our side. right now we have 145,000 clues that our officers are working on. they're following up on all of those clues. obviously, some of them are panning out, obviously, some of them are dead ends, but we're continuing to do this search and continuing to work our clues while the events up in the san bernardino mountains unfold. i'll take a couple quick questions, but again, my information is very, very sketchy. >> how sure are we that this is -- >> well, we're not positive. and until we get this guy in custody, until he's in handcuffs and in jail, we're not going to

know for sure. they said he was similar in appearance. he was up in that area at one time. so, you know, the likelihood is that it's him, but we can't say for sure. [ inaudible question ] i can't confirm the hostage report. we were getting much of our information from the san bernardino county sheriff. i can't confirm that anybody was held hostage at this time. that's part of the san bernardino side of the investigation and that has not been confirmed yet. [ inaudible question ] i can't give you specifics about what resources we have up there. we believe this individual may be watching tv or may have some access to media, so i don't want to tip our hand. to that end, we've asked the media that has airships in the area to not have your units show any close-ups of what the san bernardino officers are doing up in the area. the reason for that, obviously, it will put our officers at an extreme tactical disadvantage if the suspects know what our folks

are doing. >> and exchanging gunfire with the california fish and game board. >> i don't know what the involvement of the california fish and game was at this time. my understanding, it's san bernardino county sheriff's. that's from their press office, but i don't have an update from the california fish and game. i don't know what their involvement is at this time. >> the officers have known for five days, this has been a huge manhunt. it sounds like this is him. can you talk about the sentiments and feelings among officers now that it looks like he may be caught? >> everyone is very hopeful that this thing ends without any further bloodshed. we hope we can take this guy into custody and hope he doesn't hurt anybody else. we hope none of these officers were seriously injured, which we don't know at this point. the best thing for him would be to surrender and allow us to take him into custody and he can face the criminal justice system. there's a tremendous sense of apprehension among our officers here, concern about the officers that are up there. and until this guy's in handcuffs and until he's in custody, none of the people in our department are going to rest. >> what about your manpower. you said you guys are waiting.

what kind of resources did you send? >> i can't give the specifics on what resources we sent. we did send some resources, they're waiting at the airport, and are waiting to be called in by the incident commander when needed. by the way, people have been asking if the chief of police has gone out there. chief beck has not responded o out there. he's still here. >> what kind of vehicle did he steal? >> i don't have information about the vehicle that this suspect allegedly took. i've seen some videotape from the media members on that vehicle. i don't have the information about what that vehicle was. >> commander, if he is watching this, what message do you have for him right now? >> if he's watching this, the message for him is, enough is enough. it's time to turn yourself in, it's time to stop the bloodshed, it's time to let this event and let this incident be over. >> and commander, your first priority is to take him alive and put him under arrest? >> obviously, our first priority is the safety of the citizens around there. once that area is locked down and all the citizens in that

area are safe, we'll let the san bernardino s.w.a.t. team to go in there and do what they do best, which is to get this guy hopefully in custody and hopefully without any bloodshed. one more question. [ inaudible question ] are you guys actively talking or do you have to wait until it dies down? >> a couple things on that. san bernardino county sheriffs are in our jric. so they're embedded with a team of officers that are all working together to solve this thing. and they've been there since the beginning. we also sent one of our assistant chiefs out there to san bernardino. he's in their command most. we're getting realtime updates from them, to our command, so we know what's going on up there. probably a very good exchange of information. so we work really well with our law enforcement partners throughout southern california. okay? >> what kind of weapons -- >> i don't know the weapons that he had. i know he had reports of all different kinds of weapons. i don't know what he was using occupy there in this exchange of gunfire. that's all we have time for right now. i'll be out again, if anything

big breaks on this, we'll be back out again, and we'll give you a further update and our update will be right here. i have a spanish speaker here who can answer any spanish media questions for you and i'll turn it over to captain rigo romero. >> all right. so there you have it. the latest from the commander, the spokesman for the lapd, andrew smith, telling us they are not positive, although they believe it is likely that christopher dorner is in this barricaded cabin there in bare mountain, outside of los angeles, about a two-hour drive. they cannot confirm that there are hostages. they say they don't know whether or not there are hostages. the suspect may be watching tv. as a result, they've asked the media to avoid any live broadcasts from the area, broadcasts that potentially could help the suspect in this particular case. and they say, and andrew smith, the lapd commander, said, enough is enough. give yourself up if you are watching tv. enough is enough. face the justice system right now. anderson is here. chris cuomo is here.

anderson, this is a very delicate situation, because i suspect they really dona't know if there are hostages inside. >> yeah, it seems like this cabin is really the second cabin that christopher dorner has been in. "l.a. times" is reporting that for days now, he has been in another cabin, with the -- and he held a couple hostage inside that cabin. that's where he's sort of been waiting it out. as you know, there's been sort of radio silence on his end. no activity that authorities were aware of. this is the first time he's been spotted really, i think, new no two days, maybe even three days. and it seems like this is another cabin he's gone to. "l.a. times" is also reporting, according to just one source, he fired at a sheriff's deputy from inside the cabin, then tried to leave through the back of the cabin, set off a smoke bomb, opened up fire, shot another sheriff's deputy there, and was driven back inside the cabin. >> there's good news and bad news in this situation as it develops. the good news is, there are a lot of assets on the ground. local, state, and federal officials are working together. they have resources to deal with him being alone or with someone

else. the bad news is, of course, there is unknown, and we do know there's already been a lot of gunfire today. earlier, we heard a report from a local reporter on kcbs, who was very close to the scene, before all the authorities were there, when he was being chased buff a stolen vehicle, and this is what we heard in the background. take a listen. >> you! come here! [ gunfire ] [ gunfire ] hey! [ bleep ] get out of here, pall!

[ gunfire ] [ gunfire ] >> get down! [ gunfire ] >> what that tells us, obviously, a lot of gunfire over an extended period. we know that the suspect is

suspected to have 30 weapons. we know he's trained. we believe this would have been the gunfire volley that led to the two deputies being injured and now being medevaced for emergency medical services. and that is what took us up to this point, where now the suspect is inside, but we don't know whether he's alone. there are varied reports we're hearing about, about how this happened. but we just really don't know. and we have to take the fact that the authorities are being very cautious to mean that they may suspect there is more potential life at risk. >> it sounded like a war that was going on, that gun battle we just heard. >> certainly a lot of activity. you could hear one person yelling to the reporter, get the "f" out of here, and the reporter, apparently his local station tried to make contact with him, wasn't able to make contact with him, but later learned he was doing fine. carter evans, a reporter with the local cbs affiliate. let's check in with casey winans, who's standing by.

casey, in terms of how this is going now, can you give us a sense of what we heard from that press conference, what we know and what we don't know? >> reporter: well, anderson, the way it started this afternoon about 12:30 local time, 3:30 eastern, there was a report of a stolen vehicle near the big bear ski lift areas, near the resort area. we don't know exactly how close to the resorts that vehicle was stolen, but that vehicle was stolen right near the ski resorts. deputies began a pursuit, also set up a road block, because there were indications that this was someone who looked like christopher dorner. there was a shoot-out, apparently, at that roadblock. the vehicle was spotted at a place called glass road and highway 38, 27 miles away from where that vehicle was reported stolen. 27 miles around the mountain and down the hill, toward the more populated area of southern california.

dorner then got apparently into another shoot-out, and then escaped into this cabin where there are reports that he may or may not have had hostages. the "l.a. times" reporting that there were hostages in a cabin that he was holed up in over the past several days. what is clear, though, is that he was trying to escape, trying to get down that mountain, and law enforcement officers have been able to stop him from at least doing that, but right now, holed up inside a cabin, very dangerous situation, anderson. >> yeah, you know, we've actually just been given a report from the "l.a. times," in which a woman named candy martin has identified a vacation cabin from the television that's been surrounded by police. she called the authorities to let them know that that cabin is just one in a cluster of seven cabins that she owns along route 38 near the community of seven oaks, which, again, casey, as you just said, that's route 38, highway 38 and glass road, that's where that shoot-out occurred in the stolen vehicle.

this woman, candy martin, has told police that the cabins actually are supposed to be empty on monday, had no cable, no phone, and no internet service, which is obviously significant, because authorities would obviously be concerned about his ability, dorner's ability to monitor what they are doing via television, via radio, or via the internet. again, this is just one source telling the "l.a. times" that there is apparently no cable, no phone, or no internet service in there, and also no firearms inside, that belong to the owner of this cabin, what christopher dorner may have with him, though, we certainly don't know, casey. >> these are roadblocks, right now, that people are checking vehicles. obviously, they don't want to let dorner, if in fact he is in this area, escape. you see them opening up the trunk. they're watching all these cars. these, in fact, are live pictures we can show our viewers. these are roadblocks, local law

enforcement authorities, chris cuomo, they're on the scene. you see the cars backed up. i think each car is going to be checked before that car is allowed to leave. >> probably. this is an abundance of caution. you don't know what the understanding on the ground is. you always want to err on the side of caution. that's what they're doing. it's obvious to anybody watching, they're doing what is a basically vehicle search. why? we don't know. the man who we want the most, supposedly, they know where he is. maybe they're not 100% sure about where he is, so they're acting to make sure, as well as they can, that anybody who leaves the area is not the suspect. >> because you heard the commander of the lapd spokesman, andrew smith say, they're not positive, they say it's likely that dorner is inside that cabin, but he specifically said, and i'm quoting him now, we can't say for sure. so they don't know. >> well, he's certainly very well armed, whoever's in that cabin, and he was able to

exchange gunfire with two deputies, very effectively. so if, by some chance, this is not the man who they believe to be the suspect, he is a very dangerous man, because he's already put two sheriff's deputies in the hospital. >> it's interesting, we've heard a big sort of change from the lapd, just in the last couple of days, from when this incident began, talking about dorner and about his allegations of racism, his allegations of corruption, his allegations of mistreatment by the lapd. initially, the lapd ruled out the possibility that any of these allegations the needed a second look. and we've now heard from the chief, just yesterday or the day before that, saying, in fact, they will open up an investigation. they will look bank account the initial incident that precipitated chris dorner from getting fired from the los angeles police department. they wanted to make sure not in any way it justifies anything that he has done, but just to kind of allay the public's concern, any concern that's out there, because there has been, as you know, wolf, some sympathy for this man. you've seen it on twitter, you've seen it on the internet,

facebook sites popping up, given the history of the los angeles police department, the incidents of, you know, in rampart, most recently, but obviously the rodney king incident, the riots, there's a history with this department and they have made great strides over the last couple of years to try to present a new face, to get a lot more minority officers in the lapd, but certainly, the lapd does seem concerned about the public relations problem they may have and they've been trying to address that by saying that they're going to look at the allegations. >> they have a real problem. i'm sure you're seeing it online, i'm getting a lot of it, because i seem supportive of the police, but of course we are. if you have an interest in justice, fairness under law, you have to distinguish about what you believe about a history from a current set of circumstances. it does not matter whether or not police are infallible. of course they are not. what's going on in this situation, with this suspect, is that claims that were made on a review of the record of his dismissalal show them to be baseless. yes, they are reopening it. that's good.

fresh eyes are always good eyes, truth is goal, but people have to be careful that this is not about calling the police perfect. this is about dealing with what is before us, the man who is believed to be a suspect in this situation is a killer. he is targeting police, and that is wrong, no matter what the history involved here, to conflate the two is a mistake. of course, people are going to be upset. of course, people will have reasons to be suspicious about the authorities, but let's keep our eye on the ball here, to everybody who wants to assess the situation. right now, we have a dangerous man, believed to be in a cabin, authorities are searching cars. and in this case, there is only one way to see it, and it is that this man needs to be stopped. >> no justification for killing innocent civilians. you may have some reason for grig, but there's no justification for going out and killing three people, as he allegedly has done. we're watching the cars being checked, as they leave this area of the big bear california area. they believe they have the suspect cornered, but they're not 100% sure.

this is what the commander of the lapd, the spokesman, andrew smith said, a little while ago, when he was asked to address dorner directly. >> if he's watching this, a message for himself is, enough is enough. it's time to turn yourself in, it's time to stop the bloodshed, it's time to let this event and let this incident be over. >> the great fear, though, anderson, and we've seen these kind of incidents over the years, and sometimes it ends the way the police spokesman just hoped it would, but very often it doesn't. >> and certainly, for those who have read his manifesto, so-called, there's been a lot of belief that there's not really many other ways for this to end, but some sort of confrontation. that this is not somebody who -- you know, some people who knew him over the airwaves over the last several days, with the hope that maybe he was watching some of these programs, some of these people who he said he respected, you know, were trying to send out the message that the best thing you can possibly do, if

you want to get your message, if you want to get your grievance and your gripe across is to give yourself up. then you will have a chance to be heard. if you try to go out in a hail of bullets, the chance of, you know, other people hearing your message, it's not going to be heard, given the way you've chosen to end this. clearly, that message has not gotten through. we now see what appears to be this man cornered in a house, this entire area surrounded, as you see, vehicles being searched in a wide perimeter around this area. and, you know, as chris pointed out earlier, with night falling, you know, it adds some other challenges, but they have a lot of assets in place. we also heard from the lapd earlier that they have a number of what he's described as lapd resources waiting at the airport, waiting to be called in, by the san bernardino county sheriff's department. they have not been called in. i assume those resources would be s.w.a.t. teams, tactical units. right now this is an operation being run by the san bernardino

police department or sheriff's department and the lapd is sort of watching. >> and what we're watching on screen right now seems to be a routine check of vehicles. but let's bring back tom fuentes. he's a former assistant fbi director. tom, if you're there, is this what it seems to be? what would be the tactical response going on here? >> well, right now, they're trying to set up on that cabin and get all of the resources near that cabin that they need and establish communication with him, to see if there's any way to learn for sure that he has hostages or does not have hostages. as far as the roadblock checks that you're seeing now, that would be a little bit further away. they would have established the perimeter around the area and would be checking, you know, if residents returning to their homes, then they're going to let them in and they're going to check on that and make sure he doesn't have an accomplice coming to help him. another factor in this is that during this past week, while he's been, you know, loose, you do have the situation where, you know, now we know that he's

invaded one home at least, many of the homeowners in that area are likely to have firearms. they're in a remote, mountainous wooded area, police response might take a little time. so you would have hunters and sportsman and people who may legitimately have firearms in their home that he may have obtained. so even though he had a lot of weapons to begin with, he could have been in a position to obtain additional weapons, additional ammunition, just from the homes up in that area. or if he broke into cabins that were unoccupied during this past couple of days, there may have been weapons in those cabins that he obtained. so that's another factor in this, as far as whether he's very heavily armed or not. >> it's a good point. so how do you deal with that going forward? what do you think the different steps are that have to be gone through by authorities? >> the steps they're taking is, as the tactical units deploy, they're going to try to get positions of observation from every angle, all 360 view of

that cabin. but at the same time, try to keep their tactical officers in as much position of cover and concealment as possible, to not expose them to gunfire from him. so at last going to be the nature of this, that they know that he's got some weaponry with him. they don't know the current caliber of weapons that he probably has, but he has something, and they're going to try to stay out of that line of fire if he comes out. and you also have the possibility that he could come running out of that cabin, guns blazing. so they do have to be in a position to respond if he tries to do some kind of a one-man cavalry charge coming out of that cabin. >> what does it say to you, tom, that they're checking all the vehicles in that area right now, if they believe that he's cornered or he's pinned down inside a cabin, barricaded inside a cabin, what does it say to you that they're going through, checking every one of these vehicles, making them stop, opening up the trunks. they've got a lot of police in the area and long lines waiting

to move. >> they have a number of concerns there. i mean wofbl, they want to make sure that they're screening residents only and that they're safe and that there isn't somebody holding them hostage, driving them back into the location. they want to make sure he doesn't have an accomplice coming up there to help him out, even somebody he doesn't know. could be some sympathizer that's been watching the broadcast for a week and has decided that they're on his side and are going to give him some help. or it could with a vigilante type situation. he's killed people, he's ruined families. he's committed a terrible tragedy in a number of homes in southern california, and plus, you have 50 family members that have been in fear and under siege for the last week since the manifesto came out. so you might have somebody coming up there to try to take justice into their own hands. so there's any number of possibilities that could be bad, as far as the vehicles coming to that area. they just want to make sure that the people that are there belong there and are safe.

>> tom fuentes, we heard a report, again, the source on this at the "l.a. times," a source that a woman who believes she owns the cabin that police have now surrounded, the sheriff's department has actually surrounded, she's actually called into the authorities, telling them that that cabin, that there is no cable service, no phone service, no internet service, and that there were no firearms in that particular cabin. now, as you pointed out, we don't know how many other cabins he's been in the last couple of days. there was another report from the "l.a. times" that he had actually held a couple hostage for several days in a cabin. we don't know if there were any firearms in that cabin. but in terms of not having phone, not having internet, not having tv, how important is it for authorities right now to actually try to establish connection with this man, or given what the crimes they believe he has committed, at this point, are they just more interested in surrounding this and kind of waiting him out? >> no, they're going to want to try to get communication with him as soon as possible. and especially if there is a possibility of hostages, which there is, they want to try to

verify that as soon as possible. so the police will be trying to get a phone to him, if he doesn't have one in there, they'll be trying some method, in the beginning, it's going to be literally shouting on a megaphone from behind a tree, trying to establish some rudimentary communication, until you can get an electronic means the to have a more effective or efficient communication method. but that would be the procedure here, is you're going to want to get that communications established with him as soon as possible. and, again, whether he has tv coverage or not, this is somebody who's trained. it's not an ignorant fugitive out there that's never dealt with law enforcement or doesn't know specific tactics. he's been trained by lapd, he's been in the military, he knows exactly -- and common sense, as well as training, would tell him exactly what the police are doing up there and how they're going about it and what their positions are likely to be and what their methodology and process would be in trying to resolve the tactical situation. he'd probably be well aware of the differences between how they

would handle this if he's strictly barricaded by himself or barricaded and holding hostages who are innocent in this matter. so this is not going to be any mystery or surprise to him what the police are trying to do. >> tom, hold on for a moment, because chris lawrence, our pentagon correspondent is standing by with more on his military training and what kind of capabilities he might have right now. what is the background on that, chris? >> wolf, in his manifesto, dorner said he was an expert shot. the top shot in every unit he's ever been in. that's a bit of an exaggeration, but he is very good. basically in the military, above the base line that every service member needs to qualify, there are three levels above that that indicate how quood of a shot you are. they are marksman, sharpshooter and the highest being expert. he qualified as a marksman with the rifle and he qualified as an

expert with the 9 millimeter pistol. that's the highest level a normal sailor could achieve with the gun qualification. so he is a very good shot. in addition, he's not a normal sailor like you would think of going out on, say, an aircraft carrier. he's been involved in some of these riverine patrol, the modern day equivalent of the brown navy that we saw in the rivers back during the vietnam era. he's been involved in security, doing security for oil platforms. so he has had combat arms training, and we also know that as part of that training, as part of his qualifications, he's tested and become somewhat proficient in weak side shooting. that's something that a lot of shooters struggle with. they're very good with their strong arm, usually it's the right arm, but may have troubleshooting with the weaker arm, the left arm, so to speak. that can come into play if, for example, your strong hand is damaged or hurt, or if you're concealed in such a way that you

want to keep your body concealed and not present that big of a target. if you can shoot with the weak arm, it's going to give you more flexibility in terms of staying concealed, because you're able to switch hands and shoot with both. wolf? >> and we're showing our viewers these checkpoints that have been established for everyone, basically leaving this area, big bear, california, where the suspect is believed to be holed up. they're making every car stop. they're going through the trunks, they're looking and making sure that there is nothing suspicious. so there are long lines right now. and anderson, as we see this unfold, you can see there are a lot of local, state, federal authorities and some military personnel as well. >> do we still have tom fuentes with us, standing by? >> tom, are you there? >> yes, we am. >> tom, i'm just wondering from a law enforcement perspective, given your experience, how does it change the dynamic on the ground for these law enforcement officers, given the accusations, the allegations against christopher dorner?

given that he allegedly has killed the daughter of a lapd member, who he partly blamed for his dismissal, as well as someone she was involved in a relationship, the fact that -- o or the allegations that he has shot at and actually killed one police officer, at least one, injured another, shot at others, and now we have two more, again, just according to authorities, two other sheriff's deputies who have been injured, just today alone. how does that change the dynamic for the officers who are right now surrounding this cabin? >> it actually won't change it, anderson. other than the knowledge of how capable he is of shooting first, and, you know, not worrying about who he kills, but that's something that s.w.a.t. teams would be trained for, fire discipline, in any event. you would expect that with barricaded suspects, hostage suspects.

they would have dealt with people many times in the past that are like that who didn't have the notoriety, weren't getting the international press coverage that this was getting right now. so from e s.w.a.t. team standpoint, this is something they train for, the discipline that, you know, they know what they're doing out there. they know how capable and dangerous he is. and, you know, they're factoring all that in. but i don't think it's going to change how they go about their business at all. >> tom, are you aware of what kind of s.w.a.t. team assets that the riverside county sheriff's department actually has? because we heard from the lapd in their press conference about 20 minutes ago, and we're going to replay you a chunk of that press conference in just a moment. but they said that they had lapd resources waiting at the airport, essentially waiting to be called in by riverside county sheriff's department. that those had not been called in at the time of the press conference. do we know how many, you know, tactical units, what sort of resources riverside county has? >> well, my understanding is that this was san bernardino county. that's a very, very huge county, about the size of a couple of small states.

so they have many assets. they would be well trained. one thing about all of the s.w.a.t. teams in the u.s., including federal, state, and local, is that the training has been, you know, has been pretty much unified and jointly conducted. so you would have s.w.a.t. teams, fbi marshals, state police, county police, city police, all being trained in many cases by the same instructors, under the same philosophy and strategy. so there's expertise at every level. the reason that lapd, well, obviously, they're involved in this, you know, from their own standpoint, but the reason other agencies will be coming in and offering tactical assistance is if this turns out to be a hostage situation, if this turns out to be a protracted crisis that goes for many days, now you're talking about that they might have to have shift work. they might have to have one team on duty for a certain period of time and then be relieved by another team. again, reports are that it's going to be below freezing and may already be in some of the

mountain areas up there, near big bear, and, you know, that's going to be difficult for teams to stay outdoors, deployed, out in the field, laying on the ground for hour after hour. they certainly can't stay there indefinitely by themselves. so there would be some effort for the police to establish a turnover of personnel on a regular basis, to keep them fresh, to keep them healthy and safe. >> and tom, if this cabin, as the apparent owner of this cabin has told authorities, according to a source, telling the "l.a. times," that it doesn't have phone, it doesn't have internet, it doesn't have cable, if it has electricity, is that something that the authorities want to take charge of, whether turning off his electricity -- i mean, do they want to make this difficult for him, or is that something they use as a bargaining chip? >> well, it depends. again, back to the hostage situation. if he's by himself, that's not an issue, they could turn it off and not worry about it. but if he's got hostages in there, you're not going to want to create an unhealthy or

dangerous situation for them. you're not going to want to trigger his temper and take it out on them by doing some of that. and this is similar to what we saw in the dykes hostage crisis back in alabama last week. yes, the authorities could have turned off the power and the heat, but they didn't want to do that. they had young ethan in that bunker. that becomes the primary concern in these things, is no not let any harm come to the hostage if at all possible. that's their main concern here. >> tom, hold on for a moment. we're just getting word there's going to be a news conference at the loma linda medical center. this is where these two sheriff's deputies were taken. they were injured, they were wounded in this exchange, allegedly, with christopher dorner, we're going to live coverage of that loma linda medical center news conference. you're looking at live pictures right now coming in from there. we don't know the condition of these two officers. we hope they're okay. we'll be watching that very closely. enough people, chris cuomo, have been killed and injured and

wounded in this horrible, horrible tragedy. >> absolutely, no question about that. still an emerging situation. we don't understand what's going on, on the ground, and the authorities are coordinating their response, but even at the most recent press conference that just ended minutes ago, there wasn't that information to go on. here's what the authorities the knew at that point. >> today at about 12:22 p.m., san bernardino sheriffs were in the hunt for christopher dorner, up in the big bear area. they received a call of a stolen vehicle in the 1200 block of club view drive. when they responded there, they received information from the person reporting that this stolen vehicle was stolen by an individual that appeared to be very similar to christopher dorner. they immediately conducted a ground and air search for this vehicle and were able to locate it at highway 38 and glass road, where the suspect in the vehicle fled into the forest.

shortly thereafter, this individual barricaded himself into one of the cabins there and an exchange of gunfire occurred. during that exchange of gunfire, two officers were injured. they've been airlifted to a local hospital. right now their skn unknown. the los angeles police department has sent resources out to the san bernardino county airport. our resources are waiting there for authorization from the san bernardino county sheriffs to assist them. so this is a san bernardino county sheriff's investigation. this is their lead. they have the incident command out there. we are there to support them only if asked. we are all very hopeful this thing ends without any further bloodshed. we hope none of these officers was seriously injured, which we don't know at this point. the best thing for him now would be to surrender and allow us to take him into custody and he can face the criminal justice system. there's a tremendous sense of apprehension about our officers here, concern about the officers that are up there, and until this guy's in huffs and until he's in custody, none of the people in our department are going to rest. >> what about your manpower.

you said you were waiting. what kind of resources did you send up there? >> i can't give the specific of what resources we sent. we did send some resources, they're waiting at the airport in san bernardino and we're waiting to being called in by the incident commander if we're needed. and chief beck has not responded out there. he's still here. >> what kind of vehicle did he steal? >> i don't have information about the vehicle that this suspect allegedly took. i've seen some videotape from the media members on that vehicle. i don't have the information about what that vehicle was. >> commander, if he is watching this, what message do you have for him right now. >> enough is enough. it's time to turn yourself in, it's time to stop the bloodshed, it's time to let this event and let this incident be over. >> there you have it. just a little while ago, an update from the lapd, the commander andrew smith telling us what we know. now you're looking at live

pictures. there are limited number of exit routes from the area, but local authorities, state authorities, they are watching every vehicle leave. they suspect that christopher dorner is holed up in a cabin. we don't know if there are hostages. we know that cabin is surrounded. we know there was a huge exchange of gunfire earlier in which two sheriff's deputies were injured and they were airlifted to loma linda medical center for treatment. we don't know their condition. there you see the microphones being set up at the loma linda medical center. mike brooks is joining us right now. mike, what do you make of this? you've watched these situations unfold over the years. >> yeah, and i've been involved in a number of -- many, many bare al qaedaed subjects, wolf, and i have to agree with the commander from lapd, if he's listening, enough is enough.

go ahead and give up now and no more bloodshed. i have to totally agree with the commander. but right now, the big thing is to make sure that no other law enforcement officers are injured, wolf. none of the citizens there, in the big bear lake area are injured. and to make sure that law enforcement keeps a good containment on this cabin, as nightfall moves closer. and, you know, that's the big thing. trying to find out, number one, is he in there by himself, does he have any hostages? that is going to kind of drive the way that law enforcement handles this tactical situation. also, even if he's in there by himself, wolf, they are going to try to negotiate with him. but, then, again, him being a former law enforcement officer, he may know a little bit about how negotiators go about their job, trying to get someone out of there. he may -- you know, there have been times where people have said, you know, don't pull that hostage negotiation stuff on me. you know, someone who has a background in that kind of thing, wolf. so, again, the bottom line is

here, no one else gets hurt. that's the bottom line. >> yeah, but that's easier said than done. this is -- >> yes, it is. >> -- clearly an extremely dangerous situation, especially once you have not only a former lapd cop, or rogue cop in this particular case, but you also have somebody who was trained in the military and is well armed, by all accounts. >> yeah, and that's one of the other things. how much supplies does he have? does he have food, does he have water? what was inside that cabin? but the big thing is, how many weapons does he have? how much ammo does he have? these are all things that i know investigators throughout the past week, wolf, have been trying to nail down on what kind of weapons he does have. what are his capabilities. we know that he is a military officer, or was an offer in the united states navy, and he knows what the s.w.a.t. tactics, how s.w.a.t. teams operate when they're confronted with situations like this. >> anderson is here and chris cuomo is here. chris, you wanted to make a

point. >> yeah, this tactical expert who's been sending anderson and i information over here makes a point, the low temperatures, it's going to get colder now, it's obviously a cold situation, we see snow on the ground, may work to the advantage of authorities also. because infrared equipment to find out who else is in that cabin, assuming that they know the layout of the cabin, which maybe they know better now that the owner has contacted them, works in their favor. the cooler it is inside that cabin, the more chance they have of deciding if someone else is in there, how many bodies are in there. hopefully the environment is a little bit working to the advantage of the authorities. >> and also, chris -- >> go ahead. >> no, and also, chris, one of the other things, they do have the technology, even in these temperatures, to see heat signatures, these kind of things. the other thing, as nightfall approaches is night vision gear. law enforcement, i know that most tactical teams have night vision gear. does he have that capability? one of the other things, too, that we have to keep in mind. with social media the way it is right now, twitter, there's -- how many people does he subscribe to?

does he subscribe to different media organizations in the los angeles area that are twittering what's going on in and around the cabin. that's something else that the media and other people involved in this situation have to be careful about what they put out, even in social media. >> you know, i was going to say, we're just getting sad news from the "l.a. times." unfortunately, one of the deputies who was airlifted to the loma linda medical center, we are now told by the "l.a. times," has died. i assume that's going to be part of the news conference that they're going to be having momentarily over there, just the last thing, chris, anderson, that we wanted to hear, another dead cop, as a result of what has happened here. this is awful. >> and again, the early reports on how that went down, one deputy was supposedly shot by the suspect, while he was inside the cabin. we don't know if that's the deputy who has now died. also, then, according to a source telling the "l.a. times,"

dorner attempted to flee the cabin through the rear of the cabin, set off a smoke grenade or a smoke bomb, and fired upon another deputy in the rear of the cabin, hitting him. again, we don't know which of those two deputies has died, but that apparently has been now confirmed. one deputy has died, both have been airlifted to loma linda, and we're anticipating that press conference any moment. >> we hope the second deputy is going to be okay, but we don't know his condition. chris, this is an awful, awful story. and once again, we don't know whether there are hostages inside this cabin, where they suspect -- they say they don't know 100% that dorner is inside. they suspect that he is inside, but we don't know for sure and we don't know if anyone else is inside with him. >> can't fault their caution at this point. earlier, i was speculating that one of the reasons that they may be going slowly is because there's someone inside. however, given the information we just got, so terrible, and while we don't know the name, and that's probably good, but everybody's thoughts and

prayers, i'm sure, going to that deputy's family. it's terrible that there was more life lost here in a situation where it's so needless. but you can understand their reluctance, the officers that are there. this man is highly trained. he is well armed. and obviously, very proficient, and he can take their lives. so it's just horrible to think what's going through the minds and hearts of those men and women who are outside the cabin right now. >> a little bit of good news from a law enforcement perspective. again, according to the woman who believes she's the owner of one of these cabins, candy martin, who has talked to authorities. she said that the cabin was supposed to be empty on this day, that there was supposed to be nobody there, in addition to no internet service, no phone service, no television. so, if this is a cabin that christopher dorner just burst his way into, it seems, according to the owner, there was not supposed to be anybody inside the cabin. that could be a little piece of good news. of course, we don't know, did he grab somebody along the way? questi we don't have that information. casey wian is standing by, and

casey, we've just got that terrible word that one sheriff's deputy has died. >> reporter: yeah, it is terrible news, obviously, anderson, bringing the number of victims, fatalities in this case to four. the other -- the first two victims, monica quan, keith lawrence, an engaged couple, a week ago sunday, who were shot in the community of irvine, california, and then riverside police officer michael crane, 11-year veteran of the riverside police department, also two tours in the marine corps in kuwait. he was shot and killed on thursday. i wanted to point out one other thing, anderson. as we were looking at these pictures of vehicles being searched, coming down the mountain from big bear, one after the other, there's been the question raised, why are they searching these vehicles so closely? one of the reasons, clearly, is the fact that authorities are very concerned that he could have an accomplice. michael dorner, the arrest warrant that the u.s. marshal's service released just a day or

so ago, said that the authorities were tracking the movements of someone identified by the initials of j.y. he was a known associate of dorner and a family member of this j.y. owns residential property in the big bear area. and dorner's truck was found burning on thursday, right near that residential property. so, obviously, one of the areas of concerns here, for people coming down that mountain and for law enforcement, is making sure that no one who might have helped dorner gets off that mountain. one other point i want to make, we've shown the long, long lines of cars coming off of that mountain. earlier this afternoon, the mayor of big bear lakes, in an interview with wolf blitzer, said he didn't think that there was any way that dorner could escape, that he could get off of that mountain. and that long line of cars shows you why. once you get on highway 38 there, you can't do anything but go down or go up. that's what law enforcement has, at least, going for them.

there's not a lot of escape routes for dorner right now. anderson? >> and it is certainly -- the weather, it looks much better today over the last several days, casey, it has not been cooperating. it's made it very enforcement t area, to get air assets in place, helicopters up in the sky. early on we were told on thursday or friday, he believe it was, that they had air assets in place with infrared, capable of searching for anybody out in the woods but they weren't able to get those up in place because of a storm system moving through. >> that's right. there was a big snowstorm over the weekend in the big bear area that grounded all of that aircraft, freezing cold temperatures, wind chill factors below zero. so there were a couple of days where there were no air assets at all. over the weekend the skies cleared, they were able to have helicopters up in the air with heat sensors, body heat sensors on those helicopters. obviously they did not provide

any successful results over the weekend, but those helicopters were available today. they were not in the air, at least initially, but once that vehicle was reported stolen, they got in the air quickly. >> as we're following this situation, there's a little bit of a degree of frustration to what we're watching, nothing's really happening. we're told that there's a suspect who they believe to be christopher dorner inside the cabin. we don't have any 100% confirmation on that. but of course, the concern here is just that this ends safely, safely, even for dorner, that they are able to do what the lapd suggested in their news conference, bring him into custody, allow him to tell his side of what his motivations are. let justice take its course. but at a minimum, that the killing stops. the most recent news that a deputy involved in a shootout with the suspect today has lost his life punctuates that point. of course this is frustrating as

we watch it and we try to make sense of the tactics that are going on and the procedures. we all want it to end but unfortunately, this is the way these situations often play out. >> it's a sad, sad story indeed. let's hope it doesn't get sadder as we watch what's going on. just want to remind our viewers we're waiting for a news conference from the loma linda medical center. they will be briefing us on the condition, we have been told the "l.a. times" reporting that one of the officers who was engaged in this shootout with dorner has passed away. our deepest, deepest condolences to his family. tom fuentes, we don't know the condition of the other sheriff's deputy. i assume we'll find out fairly soon. but as we watch what's going on, he may not have internet, he may not have television, but he can definitely have other ways of finding out what's going on if he's creative as he apparently is. >> reporter: well, i think he's getting to know exactly what's going on even if he was

completely without communication. he's a trained police officer. he's going to know exactly what the tactics would be here, the way they're going to deploy a s.w.a.t. team, negotiators, sniper observers, other tactical support, logistical support for the teams up there, possible change of shifts, if that comes into a longer time period up there. so i think that from that standpoint, this is a much different hostage taker or barricaded subject, if you will, because it's actually someone who knows the tactics, who has been there and has been trained to deal with it from the outside looking in. now he's on the inside looking out. i don't think that's going to be a huge factor here of what he knows or doesn't know. he can assume what the police are doing and that's going to be exactly what they're doing. >> tom, i'm wondering what you think of his tactics thus far. it seems that in a number of the shootouts that he's allegedly engaged in with authorities, he's really kind of taken the fight to them. he's been very aggressive. it's not as if he's sort of a

sniper hanging out at a location just trying to pick people off. he's actually exited his vehicle, approached police officers, firing according to the early reports, and again, these are just early reports. in the incident today, driving a white pickup truck, he actually crashed that pickup truck, exited the vehicle, began firing at officers and then wound up in this nearby cabin. again, upon trying to exit this cabin, according to one source telling the "l.a. times" from the rear, set off a smoke bomb, shooting at one sheriff's deputy. what do you make of his tactics thus far? >> reporter: well, normally that would give him the advantage. if you're on offense instead of defense, that means the police that are defending themselves have to react to whatever it is you've started. so if he comes out guns blazing, they suddenly have to draw weapons and try to return fire and hope that they're not hit in the interim which unfortunately, several have been. secondly, you have someone that's basically had superior fire power and that's another issue in this situation.

the average police officer on the street's going to have a pistol, maybe a shotgun in the patrol car, if they're all out expecting him, they might have a little bit more capability, more fire power capability, but generally, the heavy weaponry of police are normally in the hands of the tactical units that are trained on using them every day like s.w.a.t. teams and units like that. so now you have a situation where he knows what he's going to do, the police don't know. he can see them and their marked units and uniforms. they can't tell if he's just another civilian or not and he's got better fire power than the average police officer on patrol. so every one of those situations gives him an edge. >> in terms of the timeline on this, tom, time is on i assume the side of the authorities in this. if there are not hostages involved, they can essentially wait him out, can't they? >> reporter: they can, but i think once they determine -- if they were able to determine that there's positively no one else in that cabin except him, they

don't need to wait forever. they can give him a reasonable time, then they can start launching gas and other measures into that to literally smoke him out. but in the interim, again, you might have a gas mask and just be sitting there laughing. you know, there's a lot to deal with but it's much more difficult if there's hostages and barricaded. barricaded, the police don't quite need the same degree of patience that hostages require. >> tom, hold on for a moment. miguel marquez is on the scene. miguel, where are you? i understand you're near one of those checkpoints? >> reporter: we are about ten miles from the scene where this is happening. we're on highway 38 in the town of mentone at the base of the mountain. we believe mr. dorner is holed up in a cabin just north of here. it is a massive police presence here with tons of other law enforcement vehicles heading up the hill, speeding up the hill

as fast as they can possibly go. all traffic into and out of the hill right now, this really massive area east of los angeles, is now shut down, wolf. >> so basically it's impossible to get -- are you saying it's impossible for you to get closer to the scene? you're about ten miles away? >> reporter: it is impossible, yes. keep in mind this becomes a single lane in and out of the san bernardino national forest, in and out of the big bear lake region. the place where we believe mr. dorner is held up is a cabin south about seven miles south of big bear lake, directly south. this road sort of takes a big long loop up into big bear lake so this road, 38, goes right past that area called the seven oaks town or neighborhood in the san bernardino national forest up there. that's where he appears to be held up and it appears, i understand from law enforcement

that they may be ready to go in at some point and try to forcibly remove him from that cabin. >> we'll see what happens on that front. obviously if he's inside by himself, it's one thing. if there are hostages, if there are innocent people inside with him, it becomes a much more complicated situation. this could go on, chris cuomo, anderson cooper, for awhile. >> yeah, no doubt about it. as tom fuentes said, what they need to find out right now is are there hostages inside that cabin. exactly what the situation with the layout of the cabin, and then they'll take it from there. as tom fuentes formerly with the fbi was saying, it's a much better situation for them if there are not hostages inside and they could very easily start to put in gas, put in stun grenades and go in after this guy. >> i just want to alert our viewers also that of course the president of the united states will be addressing a joint meeting of the united states congress tonight for his state of the union address.

that will begin at 9:00 p.m. eastern. this particular story, chris, it's certainly dominated the last few hours, indeed the attention of the nation and much of the world is focused right now. they want to see this resolved. >> absolutely. hopefully time is what brings safety to this situation. there has been so much killing already. if the time allows for preparation, allows the suspect if it is this gentleman christopher dorner to be brought in safely so that justice can take its course, he can get his fair hearing and nobody else gets hurt, then all the time that it takes, no matter how frustrating, is certainly worthwhile. >> remember, this all began about three, three and a half hours or so ago, this latest incident, this exchange of gunfire at a roadblock. really, authorities have been spending the last several hours just trying to kind of get their hands around the situation, get the entire area locked down, as you see it is pretty locked down right now. there are roadblocks for miles outside of this area and